Prepaid Phone Cards

They come in thousands of different flavors and denominations, available for both domestic and international use. Some focus on a specific country, like the Philippines, while others are more "general purpose." These cards are typically sold by companies that do not own lines and are not carriers - instead, the companies have purchased calling time from a carrier at "wholesale" prices. This means two things: you often get very cheap rates, and you often get very poor service. Connections vary according to what carrier the card vendor did business with.

There are two types of phone cards on the market today: Physical cards and Virtual cards.

Physical cards . A physical card is made of paper, has a slick surface with some pretty artwork on it, and can usually be purchased from a store or gas station or even a vending machine. On the back of the card, toward the bottom, is thin rectangle of film that you can scratch off with your fingernail or a coin. Underneath that film is a unique PIN that allows you to place a phone call. We'll discuss PINs in a moment.

Virtual cards. These types of cards are quickly replacing Physical cards in the marketplace. Remember, when you buy a phone card, the only thing of real value is the PIN. The paper and pretty designs are worthless, and once you've used up your allowed time, you'll throw the physical card in the trash. Well, a PIN is just a number, and the Internet is really good at delivering numbers - they're emailed to you! This means that you can order your "card" on the Internet, then have the PIN emailed to you directly. There's no paper card to scratch or throw away and you don't have to make a trip to the store. Once your PIN arrives in your Inbox, you just write it down (or print it out) and then use the dialing instructions that you'll be sent to place your calls.

Other terms you should understand:

PINs: To use a prepaid calling card, you will normally dial a 1-800 number to get to an automated voice prompt. The voice will tell you to enter your PIN (sometimes referred to as an "authentication code"). PIN is an acronym for "Personal Identification Number." Once you enter your PIN, the automated voice will usually tell you how many minutes or credits you have left on the card, and the voice will usually come back and warn you when you have 1-3 minutes remaining in your current call. The specifics depend on the carrier and the card.

Connection Fees: Some cards charge connection fees, which is a dollar amount subtracted from your card for each call after the first. To offset the connection fee, such cards usually offer more minutes upfront. So if you like long calls of 45 minutes or more, the connection fee is not a burden, and the extra minutes you get with most connection-fee cards will offset the one or two connection fees you may pay. However, if you were to place multiple calls (three or more) with a connection-fee card, and that connection fee were, say, $2.50, you would eat up half of your calling time with connection fees alone. For that reason, if you like short calls, you should stick to a no-connection fee card.

Rounding: Cards are usually "rounded up" to a certain preset level of minutes. For example, if you purchased a card with 3 minute rounding, a 3 minute call would deduct 3 minutes from your card, but a 4 minute or 5 minute call would deduct 6 minutes from your card. This is because the card "counts" by 3's - 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, etc. Some cards use up to 5 minute increments, while a few use as low as 1 minute increments. Obviously, you want to have the lowest number possible.


The Pros:

The absolute cheapest method of calling the Philippines.

Also the cheapest way to call the States from the Philippines.

Travel-ready: take them with you and call from anywhere.

Keeps you on your budget by forcing you to limit your time on the phone.

You can send a card to a loved one in the Philippines for emergency use in contacting you in the States.


The Cons:

Quality varies according to carrier - can be good or bad. Occasional busy signals during peak hours.

If the vendor does not provide virtual or emailed PINs, you have to wait for the card to arrive in the mail to place a call. Note that all my PINs are delivered by email very quickly.

Connection fees can eat up most of a card's available calling time if you make more than two calls per card. For that reason, I recommend you only buy "no connection fee" cards, or cards in $5 denominations, unless you make very long phone calls.

Advertised # of minutes for many cards is almost always inaccurate; for example you may only get 58 minutes out of a card the advertises 70. Why? Because sellers of phone cards, like sellers of everything, advertise "best case" scenarios. The rate most phone card vendors provide is the rate you'd get IF there were no domestic or international taxes, tariffs, or fees. By way of comparison, a furniture or appliance store might advertise a washing machine at $10 a month. This sounds great, but then you have to consider the possibility that you'll be paying 8% interest, that you'll be making dozens of payments over several years, that you'll have to pay taxes and delivery charges, and that you might have to file a rebate claim. Caveat emptor, friend. My general rule of thumb is this: Whatever a phone card's per minute rate is advertised at, multiply that figure by 1.25. For example, if you're told that a phone card provides 10 cents a minute to the Philippines, 10x1.25 = 12.5 cents per minute. This isn't a guarantee, it's just a technique you can use to get a better idea of what a card might REALLY give you as opposed to what the ADVERTISED rate implies.

Vendor service for cards is often very bad, sometimes non-existent; the support number on the back of the card is of dubious value. However, if you have any problems with any SpeedyPin card offered through this site, you can contact me personally, bobukhan@yahoo.com, and I'll work on your behalf to get the problem solved. I'm happy to report that this is almost never required of me. I chose SpeedyPin because of the company's reputation and reliability, which means that problems are very, very rare.

Minutes are often rounded in large increments, like 5 minutes. Be careful. I personally wouldn't recommend a card that rounds higher than 3 minutes.

Saturday night calling is not always successful because of an unusually high volume of calls into the Philippines at that time. Saturday night in the U.S. is Sunday morning in Asia, and thousands of Filipino workers in Hong Kong get Sunday off from work. They use it to call home, jamming the communication lines. Some patience is required; or better yet, call another time.

If the person in the Philippines is using a cell phone, it is very possible that your per minute rate will be much higher than the standard per minute rate.