Russia calling, Russia calling - but what should it cost?
My new Russian penfriend telephoned me last night. I think it was her first international phone call, so I was well impressed!
She didn't want to chat for long, because it was costing her 10 rubles a minute. Surely it can be done for less, I said. I can phone you for 2p a minute, thanks to my cheap international telephony provider. My German penfriends explained this trick to me, and if you use penfriends to help you learn a language, it's very useful. I won't tell you which company I use but if you google for "cheap international phone calls from UK" then you are spoiled for choice.
But alas, neither of us is good enough in the other language for a discussion on telephony. Also if you are of a certain age (i.e., mine) it just doesn't seem possible that you can phone half way round the world for coppers. It took Mr Worrier and a lot of googling to convince me that this really was legal.
So here's my question, how do I explain this to my Moscow buddy? Can anyone recommend a Russian web site that would explain the options to her?
Re: Russia calling, Russia calling - but what should it cost
Quote:
Originally Posted by rainbowworrier
My new Russian penfriend telephoned me last night. I think it was her first international phone call, so I was well impressed!
She didn't want to chat for long, because it was costing her 10 rubles a minute. Surely it can be done for less, I said. I can phone you for 2p a minute, thanks to my cheap international telephony provider. My German penfriends explained this trick to me, and if you use penfriends to help you learn a language, it's very useful. I won't tell you which company I use but if you google for "cheap international phone calls from UK" then you are spoiled for choice.
But alas, neither of us is good enough in the other language for a discussion on telephony. Also if you are of a certain age (i.e., mine) it just doesn't seem possible that you can phone half way round the world for coppers. It took Mr Worrier and a lot of googling to convince me that this really was legal.
So here's my question, how do I explain this to my Moscow buddy? Can anyone recommend a Russian web site that would explain the options to her?
As Ramil said earlier, your penfriend could use phone cards. I also sometimes have to call Poole, England and there's no way I'm paying 10 roubles a minute. 10 roubles a minute is what the state-owned company which provides phone services to most of the population charges for international costs. It's rather a big sum for most Russians, so many prefer to make international calls through widespread phonecards. There are loads of them in the market, so there's surely a choice. As for me, I use the "Arctel" phone cards. In Russian it's spelt АРКТЕЛ. I can't recall exactly now how much they charge but it seems like a 20-dollar card lasts for over 3 hrs (calls from Moscow to Poole). If your penfriend needs more info about Arctel, I could work out the cost of a minute.