Say NO! to Long Distance

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

About a year ago I was getting disgusted with the ever-increasing rates of my phone bills. Even though I'm not a verbose person and don't make a lot of long distance calls, my monthly bill was $45+ a month, with no additional services.



When discussing this with a coworker one day, he told me he eliminated his long-distance carrier and only uses 10-10 numbers to make long distance calls. Hmmm, interesting idea.



I decided to give it a shot. After MANY phone calls, I succeeded in ridding myself of LD service (which was TouchAmerica, one I was defaulted to when Qwest came into town). I got the runaround like you wouldn't belive, and I got all sorts of comments like "well I don't think you can do that" or "you need to call this number first" and "you can discontinue your LD carrier but you still have to have Local Long Distance. "



It was rather confusing trying to sort out what options/portions you HAD to keep on your bill to maintain your basic service, and what you could whack off. It ended up being my local phone company would carry all long distance calls within my area code (509) for 7-9c a minute, and then all other calls I could use whatever 10-10 number I wanted. However just a few months ago there was a change where now I can make ALL LD calls using my 10-10 number.



I got online and found a website, 10-10 phonerates.com that compares 10-10 companies and I chose one that looked good. I immediately chose 10-10-220. . . NOT! . . . I ended up going with WorldXChange since they had the best price. It was 4. 0c a minute then (for me it is still 4. 0c a minute but they jacked up the rate for newbees ).



Immediately my phone bills dropped $20 a month. Woohoo! What amazed me was my long distance charges. On a recent statement I talked 70 minutes, charges were $2. 80 for time and 58 cents in total taxes. That's it! I love it when I get the "checks" from AT&T to lure me to them. . . they get ripped up and thrown in the trash. I whenever I see LD ads on TV



So if you are tired of high phone bills and LD companies harassing you to "switch," I challenge you to just say "No!"



Vaughn

 

[Tom G]

Even Cheaper Long Distance

If you happen to be a Costco member pick up an MCI card which is . 0347 cents/minute with no monthly fees. I think Sam's Club might also have a card for about the same rate. Even AT&T is only about . 04 cents/minute when you use these calling cards.



You do have to dial an access number with these cards but that's no big deal when you store the number in the handset.



Tom G.

 

[paccool]

So do you have to drop your existing long distance carrier? (mine is ATT) If you don't use them for long distance then there should be no charges from them, right?



I've been thinking of doing something but figured it would get so screwed up I would never get straightened out. Sounds like it may be pretty simple.



Stan

 

[ramman]

Check out bigzoo.com I have had good luck with them,only fee is . 75/month.

 

[JohnE]

A few years back, I used a 10-10-<em>something</em> with low rates, too. The bad thing with them is that calling card cards did not work out of state. Not sure if that was a problem of that particular company or a general problem with all 10-10.



I use the AT&amp;T card from Sam's. The prepaid rate is something around 3. 4&cent;/minute. I can use this card from home, office, or travel for the same rate. It even works from Canada to US calls. (US to Canada calls are around 12&cent;/minute.



We have no long distance setup on the telephone, too. Get this NO solicitations/tele-marketers. That tells me where the solicitors get your telephone number.



Vaughn;

Your numbers are actually around 4. 8&cent;/minute.

$2. 80 + $0. 58 = $3. 38

$3. 38 / 70 = 4. 8&cent;

Calling cards are not after taxed.



-John

 

[The patriot]

My cell phone has nation wide LD free unlimited on nights and weekends. I use this as much as possible.

Problem is, my cell bill is $35. 00, wifes is $25. 00 (she has free nights and weekends, but no free nationwide LD) and the house bill is usually about $40. 00. I dont call ANYONE from the house.

I'm thinking I should get rid of everything except my cell phone.

I get 400 minutes "on peak". This is more than I'll ever talk. The wife is another story.

Eric

 

[Whitmore]

I'm with you

Eric, WE have 4 cell phones with Union cell and its my understanding that April 1 there will be no roaming chargesso as long as you stay on Union repeters it will be like local, we have a package on all 4 phones that gives us 500 minutes per month so I think it may go all cell and drop the dern land line alltogether... ... ... ... ... ..... Kevin

 

[The patriot]

Yes Kev, same thing here. As long as I'm making the call from New Joisey, it's free on nights and weekends. During the day, it comes off my 400 minutes, which I never use up.

I shouldnt complain about the cost. My brothers bill is always over $400. 00 a month. He's an over the road owner operator.

Eric

 

[RichB59]

ccostco

We are useing MCI phone cards from costco 575 minutes for $20 bucks. After a few calls and the big run around we got rid of our long distance carrier. Most calls in the LasVegas area are NC and this works out great we are saveing money.





RichB

 

[Doc Tinker]

We use the Costco phone cards



The trouble with phone cards is the fact that payphone services scalp you for 9 minutes to place the call (that's about . 30 with a Costco card) in addition to the minutes used during the call.



The cards are great for cutting out the long distance carrier.



My daughter has no house phone. She uses a cell phone. Her bills are combined with Mrs Doc's bill, since they got the phones together. They have a package that provides unlimited minutes between them, and since that's what they use the phones most for, their bill is rather low.





Doc

 

[Deezul1]

I also use http://www.bigzoo.com/ and it works good. Had my long distance discontiued so no taxes and no fees. I also use it for local long distance so that cuts taxes and fees there also and its 3. 9 min.

 

[bighammer]

Check out Uni-Tel

I dropped ATT (long story) and started a search for new service. Uni-tel gives me direct dial (no funky prefixes or codes) for 2. 9 cents interstate and 2. 5 cents in Michigan. No fees, no special hours. It choppped our bills way down.



I don't miss ATT and their 4. 95 fee at all

 

[The patriot]

MCI

AT&T aint too bad. Ever get slammed to MCI??

The wife was told that they charged . 07 a minute, and no $5. 00 monthly fee. Well, she figured it's the same as the deal were getting from AT&T, so she agreed to switch.

What a mistake. It turned out that they charged us . 25 a minute!!! Boy was I p!$$ed!!

It took a bunch of threatening calls, but they eventually switched us back to AT&T and refunded the bill for that month.

Eric

 

[Jumbo Jet]

I dropped AT&T long time ago. Used a different 10-10 number other than 220. They charge a flat rate of $. 99 no matter the length of the call. I think we were using 10-10-811.



Recently switched from SWB to Sage Telecom which includes 60 minutes of free long distance anywhere.



I hate the fees. Amounts to an effective tax rate of 40-60%. Most of the fees are just to give free phone service to people that can't afford it. Back when I couldn't afford it, I didn't have it.



The 10-10 calls did not have all the fees at one time. Our loving socialistic government put a whoopso to that. There are associated fees with the 10-10 calls now. They will add those fees to the cards somehow.

 

[TPCDrafting]

I use 10-10-636 it's 5c per minute with a 3 minute minimum all the time. Works well if your gonna talk a while. Around here we call it Qworst not Qwest.

 

[Mad Bomber]

Long distance

One sweet .com 2. 2 cents no mothly its a 10-10 #

 

[Crazy Horse]

I just recharged my Sam's Club Calling Card. I've had it for a couple of years now. A thousand minutes for $35. 00. No hidden fees either. Some of these cards being sold have so many "small print tacked on fees" they wind up costing near 10 cents a minute. The only time I've been charged extra once in a while from a payphone, but not always.

 

[mdlowry]

When I was in the Navy in Norfolk, VA I moved into an apartment. I had a cell phone at the time that had "free" (included in the price) LD. When I called the phone company to hook up the phone, I ask not to have a LD carrier. The local phone company wanted to charge me $5/month to NOT have a service! I ended up finding one that would not have a monthly fee.