During a zoom meeting the other person sounds like a voice box, comes in/out

Help,

Up until now my zoom meetings have worked fine. Now on my end the other person talks, sounds come in/out, speaking through a voice box, and like a gargled sound. Anytime I use zoom this happens. 

We tried troubleshooting with the audio settings to make sure whatever we were using was selected. Made sure everything was up to date.  We even tried different headset, earbuds and that didn't help either.  

The only way we've got it work is the other person calls me on my phone and use camera on laptop. 

TIA