[geeks] International calling question

[Geoffrey S. Mendelson]

On Wed, Oct 01, 2008 at 08:27:51PM +0100, Mike Meredith wrote:

>I can only answer for the UK (and only to a limited extent). But
>mobiles or landlines ?

Thanks,

Mostly landlines. What do people have? Here since it's also caller
pays for airtime, and cell phones are a lot cheaper than landlines
to buy into, people have cell phones and no landlines at all.

My oldest son had a cell phone since he was 18 (he's 26) and when
he moved out at 20, moved into apartments with a landline, but never
used it. Now he and his wife have cell phones, but no landline at all.

I assume (and it's an assumption) that if someone were to get an incoming
number it would be a landline number, but my VoIP provider offers cellular
numbers (on a different SP than I have), which is rare here.

>
>In general call costs are time-based rather than location based _within
>the country_ 

So it does not make a difference rate wise to pick a number anywhere, 
assuming you have a choice. 

>Calls to anywhere in Europe are international calls, but generally a
>good deal cheaper than more distant places :-
>
>So international calls are hideously expensive if you don't make them
>very often, and pretty reasonable if you do it regularly!

Here too. Do people join these plans if they are "occasional" callers,
or only heavy users? For example, I am automaticly enroled in a plan
for my landline from my ISP. It includes cheaper rates and 10 free
minutes to the US a month. I've never used more than the 10 minutes
so I've never asked what the rates are.

>
>Calls to mobiles is a whole different ball game ... and more expensive.

Everywhere in the world except the US (and maybe Canada), where the
airtime charge is payed for by the person who is being called.

>No, or rather not usually.

So anyone in the UK (does that count Northern Ireland, or just Scotland
Wales, and England?) is pretty much the same price to call.

>International calls on the other hand (even to Europe) are thought of
>as only something to do in a real emergency, unless of course you do it
>regularly when you find a cheaper way of doing it.
>
>I get the feeling that young people (no longer me!) text more than they
>phone.

I get that feeling too. However the last time I replied to a text message,
(on the same network), it cost me more than a 30 second call, which since
all I said was "yes, call me in the morning", was more than it was worth.

Geoff.

-- 
Geoffrey S. Mendelson, Jerusalem, Israel gsm at mendelson.com  N3OWJ/4X1GM