Does anyone have any opinions on the best phone calling cards?
We need to make calls to France and are at a loss; our phone service with Qwest is no bargain, nor is, especially, our Verizon cell phone. All the phone cards I see at Safeway or Target etc. say “International Rates Vary.”
Hence my query, which does not seem straightforward enough for the General Questions forum.
I use a phone card called PayLess. I don’t know if they are available where you live, but I usually pay under 10 cents a minute to call Rio de Janeiro.
Usually, these types of phone cards are sold in immigrant markets or in dollar stores.
To Western Europe, rates in the 3 to 4 cents per minute range are common. You can do that with a card bought at the local immigrant grocer, with a 1010- dialaround service (I use 1010-987), or you can set up a Google Voice account and pay about 2 cents per minute.
Does it have to be actual phone service? If you have a smart phone or something like an iPod touch or a small tablet - really, anything that can connect to wi-fi and has a speaker and a microphone - you can use Skype very, very cheaply. Like a few cents a minute, depending on the plan you get. I’ve used it when calling the US from Canada, and the quality is the same as cell phone quality.
Zombie alert.
I see that I responded back in 2004. I’ve been using Skype since 2005 and Google Voice for a few years as well.