Beware of buying calling cards over the internet!
Sunday, February 25th, 2007
I have used many phone cards from many different websites. Unfortunately there is a problem with a majority of online sites selling phone cards. Either their cards do not work as advertised, or they have heavy connection fees or ridiculous minute rounding.
In addition, there are several sites that at first display a very low amount for the region that you are going to call to. BE CAREFUL, and read the fine print. Often times rates to cell phones are often double or even quadruple times more than if you were to call a traditional land line.
For example, I went to a well known calling card website. I inputted that I wanted to call from the USA to the U.K. First card that pops up show a rate of only 1.8 cents per minute. WOW that is great, I will take that so I can hurry up and call my jolly ol fellows in England. But wait a minute… Read what it says in the fine print:
USA to United Kingdom :
1.8 ¢/min , No Connection Fee, $10 = 556 minutes, $20 = 1111 minutes
Card Info
Rechargeable: [?] YES
Connection Fee: No Connection Fee
Billing Increment: 3 minutes
Maintenance Fee: 79 ¢ 1
Taxes: 15%
Payphone Surcharge: 89 ¢
Expiration: 1 Year (365 Days)
Has Local Access: [?] NO
Works from Alaska: NO
Works from Hawaii: YES
Works from Canada: YES
1 - Billed at Midnight after 1st use, then weekly
* Rates to Cell Phones are higher than advertised landline rates, due to different cell carriers
Mmm. A lot of things are there… Lets see, first of all it doesn’t work in Alaska.. Dammit! Now I cant call them from my igloo. Then I see a maintenance fee of 79 cents. What the heck is that? What kind of maintenance do they have to do on a calling card? Then find the asterik at the bottom. * Rate to Cell Phones are higher than advertised landline rates. How much? It varies depending on the carrier your are calling to. I do know that rates to call a U.K cell phone from the U.S. run around 8 to 13 cents per minute.
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