Cheap International Calls with SkypeOut
I just made a telephone call to Kolkata, India, using Skype’s prepaid international calling service, SkypeOut and I must say that the quality is prety good! Definitely at par with other “traditional” long distance phone operators. Based on my sister’s feedback, the voice quality is quite ok, but bit clipped at times, maybe because of my microphone (?). I could hear her pretty clearly.
Then, I tried by calling myself on my mobile here in Singapore, the quality was very clear.
The rates are pretty good too,
- India, € 0.174 / US$ 0.233 / S$ 0.382
- New Zealand, € 0.020 / US$ 0.026 / S$ 0.043
- Singapore (Mobile), € 0.029 / US$ 0.039 / S$ 0.063
Another good thing is the real time billing information that you can see under the “My Account” page on their website.
I also liked the fact that Skype accepts debit cards, as I don’t earn anywhere close to the S$60,000 that foreigners need to earn in order to qualify for a credit card here in Singapore.
I have been using Skype’s free service for a few days now and pretty impressed with that too.
For those not familiar with Skype, all you need to do is
[1] Download Skype from http://www.skype.com/download/
[2] Register yourself (this step is pretty simple and self-explanatory)
[3] Make free/cheap calls 