UCAN

Calling cards are not always the best deal, as noted in the article above. One has to watch every little (or big) charge, the cards can, and do, expire with minutes remaining, and they can be quite time consuming to use because of long PINs that are almost impossible to memorize. Granted, the big telecoms are ripoffs but if you do some research you can find smaller companies that are excellent and may not cost much more than some calling cards. For example, the long distance company I use charges 4.8 cents a minute billed by the second (NOT by 6, 12, or 18 seconds or by the minute). That rate includes all of the United States (except California [3.4 cents] because I live there), Canada, Australia, New Zealand and a good part of western Europe as well as other places around the world. I call the U.K. a lot and this company saves me quite a bit of money. By setting up my cell phone as directed by this long distance carrier, my cell phone carrier only charges minutes used (free nights and weekends) and my long distance carrier still charges me the same 4.8 cents per minute for the calls I make to Scotland. I am not charged a monthly fee for making these international calls and if I were to make no long distance calls at all in a given month, I am charged nothing. Best of all, because this is my land line long distance carrier, I just pick up the phone and dial. No PINs, no unused minutes because of time constraints, no extra fees for international calls.
Is there a down side? Sure. I still prefer to pay my bills by check. However, this company accepts payment only by direct debit to a bank account or credit card and bills are furnished by e-mail or the internet. I thought a long time before deciding to go ahead. So far, after seven months, this company has exceeded my expectations. For my costs, the convenience of not having to hassle with a calling card PIN, the clear connections nationally, and mostly excellent connections to overseas numbers (still much much better than my last company or the telecom giant I had before that) it beats a calling card. Fortunately or unfortunately, the days of "set it and forget it" telephone service is over.