I have no long distance service. We purchased AT&T phone cards in bulk. LD calls are 3.2 cents/minute. There are no “intro” minutes or anything like that on regular phones, but if you use them on a pay phone they nail you for an additional 6 minutes. No biggie as I have cell phone from work, which I cloned and gave one to my wife 9with the company’s approval of course).
We have many relatives/friends out of state, and make many long distance phone calls.
Since giving up LD service, our phone bill dropped by almost $105 per month, that includes factoring in the expense of the phone cards.
I cancelled my long distance 7 months ago. For domestic long distance, I use my cell phone which has a couple thousand minutes for calls made after 8:00 PM.
When I call family in Brazil, I use a phone card which gives me much better rates than any long distance company would. My last call to Brazil lasted 90 minutes and cost me around $1.90
Forget about long distance from Sprint/ AT&T/ MCI/ whatever. Forget about phone cards too. Go to www.bigzoo.com and sign up for a prepaid long distance service for only 3.9 cents a minute (2.9 cents for certain locations, but what the hell. It’s only a penny) I’ve been using them for several years now and couldn’t be happier.
Disclaimer: I have no connection with them other than being a customer. (there is a bonus program for referrals)
A good source of LD service comparisons, that doesn’t appear to be sponsored by anyone who’s trying to sell you anything, is http://www.saveonphone.com/. For comparisons of 10-10 plans, try http://www.10-10phonerates.com/.
** suziek** why does callwave (or call fwd on busy) prevent you from using callingcards (what is callwave anyway?)
k2dave: I took a look at my phone bill after your post and discovered that it is my local service, Verizon, that provides my call forwarding. So, I could drop the AT&T LD after all. I used 541 LD minutes last month, so instead of $41.51, at .035/min it would only have been $18.94. I have to pay for local service, which I rarely use at .08/min because I use a dialup modum. I pay them $27.12/mo just to have the local service. I’ve used the online phone service before and you are right, it’s a little unpredictable, but I’m going to try it again per your post. Thanks.
Also suziek local service is usually charged per call not per minute - this is the reason you want to have a local internet number.
There is sometimes something inbetween called regional which is billed per minute by your local provider (Verizon).
As you found out calling services are handled by your local provider.
I would be interested to know how the internet phone works for you. It does look like the above internet phone service does do it in a way that would work much better then previous methods.
k2dave: I meant to say the local LD charge was .08/min. I forgot to tell you about CallWave. It’s a neat little program (free for the basic one) that answers your phone calls when you are online and allows the caller to leave a message, which plays once they hang up. You need Call Busy forwarding because the incoming call is diverted to the Callwave server number. For a small fee every month you can be provided with the telephone number of the caller. I only have one phone line so it’s great for me.
So callwave looks like a online answering machine that you can set your phone to fwd calls to (w/ call fwd on busy, no answer or all calls) - also it looks like you can dial the number directly to leave a message. It looks like they have a free fax service too. What they don’t say is (or at least I can’t find it) what’s the difference between the free and pay service and how much the pay service is.
It looks like they are saying sign up then we’ll let you know the details. I am currently using efax for incomming faxes but would be interested in their fax service (although changing my fax # would be a PITA) but they don’t give much more info other then they got it. What a shame. I’m sure the service works great for you but without that info I wouldn’t even think of trying them.
What type of phone number do they provide to fwd your calls to (local, Long distance, toll free)?
interesting also that callwave won’t answer calls if your not on the net.
Not that I’m being critical, I’m rather interested in such a service. I see the value in getting faxes over the net (via efax) and would like to see what else in out there.
K2dave you are so inquisitive! The number that callers are forwarded to is 1-877-854-2861. I seem to remember that if you don’t want to get the Busy Call forwarding, you can give your friends and family an 800 number so they can leave a message. If you are not online, your phone just works as usual. With the free service you see the length of the message, the date and time. With the pay service you see the name of the caller, and there is no advertising. Go to help and I think they give you all the details. You could download the free version and all will be known! This program is strictly to allow you to be aware you have a phone call when you are online and to record a message from the caller. It’s not too sophisticated, but good for it’s purpose. I’ve been using it for over three years. RE the fax program, I know nada. But, I would try the help tab…
thanks