COMMENT
Phone A Friend - It's Dirt Cheap!

For the last month I've been trying out a cheap phone call provider that I found out about from our Living Below Your Means discussion board - and I must say I'm mightily impressed.

In the last four weeks I've made 109 telephone calls, some of them lasting more than an hour and many more than half an hour (I know, I talk a lot!) and it's cost me precisely £2.95. And that's including 45 pence for a call to the US.

Welcome to Call18866! It's a Swiss company that doesn't advertise but whose phone charges are so cheap that it doesn't need to. Word of mouth works instead.

Register with them and you'll be charged just 1p for any phone call to a landline anywhere in the UK. They say the call itself is free and the 1p is the connection fee but however you want to look at it you can talk for as long as you want, any time you want and that's all you'll pay. One penny.

Calls to mobile numbers are only 12 pence a minute, which is still pretty cheap although you'll get even better rates at 10 pence a minute if you register with 1899. Weekend calls to mobiles with 1899 are even cheaper at 2p a minute.

Either way, all you have to remember to do is to dial 18866 or 1899 immediately before dialling the relevant telephone number and Bob's your uncle. I still pay line rental to BT but nothing for my calls. (Cable customers need to use a different longer number but can still make use of the service).

At the moment I'm sticking with the option of hearing the automated voice telling me  'This is a free phone call' every time I ring someone simply because I like hearing it but you can turn that option off if you want. And I must say, I'm really looking forward to getting my next phone bill from BT - I bet I've saved a fortune!

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