New York World Phone

Betamax had pretty good rates for international calling. But due to a lot of problems (check more details at http://blog.nyworldphone.com/2008/02/06/betamax-voip-services/), people may want to to find another one to substitute.

I checked around and found that mobivox(www.mobivox.com) has a free minutes policy which is similar to gizmo project. But not like gizmo, people can make calls from regular phones.

Here is their description about the free calling policy.

3.1 What is the offer: “Free calls between MOBIVOX users”?

MOBIVOX offers free local and international calls from any phone to any other MOBIVOX member in over 40 destinations worldwide. If you are calling outside of these areas or calling friends and+ family who are not MOBIVOX members, …

3.2 What destinations are included in free calling?

Free calls between MOBIVOX members are available FROM anywhere (any country and from any phone) to:

A) Members’ mobile phones in::
Canada, China, Guam, Hong Kong, Puerto Rico, Singapore, Thailand and United-States (including Alaska and Hawaii).

B) Members’ landline phones in:
Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, China, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Guam, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mexico (Mexico City, Monterrey, Guadalajara), Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Russia (Moscow and St. Petersburg), Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, United-States (including Alaska and Hawaii), Turkey (Ankara and Istanbul), United Kingdom and Venezuela-Caracas.
C) All Skype™ users on Skype™

3.4 What does it mean if my account is inactive?

If you have not made any type of call in the previous six months, your account will become inactive. This means that you cannot make or receive free calls on MOBIVOX. Any credits that are in your account at the time it is made inactive will be lost.

  3.6 What’s the “fair-use” policy?
The fair use policy allows us to offer free calling to our users. The continuation of the free calling depends on the cooperation of the MOBIVOX community.

For calls placed through a local access number, users are entitled to receive 250 minutes of free calls per week (Monday-Sunday UTC (GMT).

For Web and SMS Call Backs, users who have added a minimum of $5 of credit to their account, will receive 250 free minutes of Web and SMS Call Back per week. For users who have never added credit to their account, Web and SMS Call Backs will be limited to a lifetime total of 250 free minutes per phone number. Once 250 minutes of free calling using either SMS Call Back or Web Call Back is reached, users will be charged at the standard rate to complete this call. To ensure you receive 250 free minutes per week of Web and SMS Call Backs, please make a minimum deposit of $5 to your account.

3.7 How do I know that a call will be free?

No Surprises! We will tell you if a call is free before connecting your call.

Make sure:

• You have made at least one MOBIVOX call
• Your friend or family member’s phone number is registered in their profile
  • Your friend has made at least one MOBIVOX call
  • You are calling one of our free destinations. See here.
  • You did not cross the free call limit of 250 minutes. You can always consult your Call History.

Check more details here: http://www.mobivox.com/help/FAQ?go=3#q3-7.

They have different ways to initiate calls. If you want to learn more about different calling methods for voip, here is a simple explanation/guide: http://blog.nyworldphone.com/2008/03/06/various-voip-solutions/.

I’ll try it and post my experience later. First thing I’m concerned is the voice quality. Another thing about the “free” thing is the tricky policy about “active users” which is like gizmo project. We’ll see how it works.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 3rd, 2008 at 1:25 pm and is filed under Betamax, Voip Services. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.