The Localphone Blog

We’re very excited to announce the availability of our most popular products for users living in or travelling to South Africa, with the addition of access numbers in Cape Town, Durban, Johannesburg, and Pretoria.

With Direct Dial we’ll give you a different South African landline number to call for each of your contacts. When you dial these local numbers you’ll be connected straight through—no need for account numbers or PINs.

With our Virtual Calling Card you can call one South African number to manage your Localphone account and to dial any number in the world.

You can now also purchase Incoming Numbers in South Africa in any of the four cities. These appear as normal landline numbers but can be forwarded to your landline or mobile anywhere in the world at our great rates, or for free to a Localphone VoIP account.

Existing users can get South African access numbers by clicking the “change” link next to “Your Location” near the top of the Localphone Direct Dial page. New users should select South Africa as “Your Country” when signing up for their free test call.

We’re very pleased we can now offer these great products to users in South Africa, and to those travelling to South Africa for the upcoming World Cup. Don’t forget to tell your friends and family and you can call and SMS for free.

To help commemorate Memorial Day we’re giving completely free calls to landlines and mobiles in the United States for the entire weekend!

As of 9:30am GMT this morning and lasting until 12:00 GMT (noon) on Monday 31st May you can talk to the US for as long as you want, to as many people as you want, and we won’t charge you a cent!

New and existing customers can make free calls from your landline or mobile using Direct Dial or Calling Card, or from your PC, iPhone, or other VoIP-enabled device with Localphone VoIP.

You can also buy a number in any of our 45 Incoming Number countries and forward calls to your landline or mobile in the US for free throughout the weekend!

Don’t forget to tell your friends and family to sign up for an account of their own, and if they keep using the service after the weekend you can keep calling for free!

For full details, please see our Cheap Calls to USA page.

India has always been one of Localphone’s most popular calling destinations, and to say thank-you for your continued loyalty we’re going to be offering all calls to Indian landlines and mobiles at just 1p / 1.5¢ / 1.2c per minute for the rest of May.

Compared to our standard rates that’s a massive saving of up to 32%!

There has never been a better time to recommend Localphone to your friends and family. For example if they top-up just $15 you’ll earn enough for 100 minutes of talk time to any landline or mobile in India, and you’ll keep on earning more for any orders they place in the first 90 days of their account! For full details see our recommend-a-friend page.

For full details of this promotion please see our cheap calls to India page.

I hope you’ll enjoy this new low rate for your calls in May. Please take a moment to become a fan on Facebook or follow us on Twitter and let us know any suggests or feedback you have for the site or service.

It’s time for another big Localphone promotion. This time we’re offering calls to a whopping 43 countries for 1¢ / 0.5p / 0.8c or less throughout March.

This offer is available for all new and existing customers. For full details and a list of the countries involved please check the Localphone Promotions page.

Don’t forget you can even call for free by recommending Localphone to your friends and family with our Recommend-a-Friend scheme.

To keep up-to-date with this and all Localphone promotions you can follow @localphone on Twitter or become a fan of the Localphone Facebook Page.

At Localphone we’re all about helping people communicate, and when is communicating more important than on Valentine’s Day?

This Sunday 14th February we’re giving away free calls to 34 countries around the world, all day long.

For full details and a list of the countries in this promotion please visit our call promotions page.

Don’t forget to keep up-to-date with our latest news by following @localphone on Twitter and becoming a fan of the Localphone Facebook Page.

Recently a few Localphone users have asked for our thoughts regarding the packages offered by some competing services, where customers pay a monthly fee and receive “unlimited” or a fixed number of minutes per month.

In our opinion these rarely offer good value for all but a relatively small number of the most heavy callers.

For example, here in the UK Vonage offers “V-Plan 4i”, advertising unlimited calls to India and others for £18.99 per month. We’ve found that a typical user calling India does so for about 400 minutes per month, giving an effective rate of 4.75p per minute (versus our current GBP rate to India from as little as 1.3p per minute).

To match our rate with Vonage you’d have to be calling for more than three times the average—almost 1,500 minutes per month!

Another common feature of these plans is a “fair usage policy” which can really sting those users that do make significantly higher numbers of calls. In Vonage’s case their fair usage policy limits their “unlimited” package to 2,000 minutes per month.

For those few users who do fall in this 1,500 to 2,000 minutes per month range we feel Localphone’s advanced features add enough value to be worth the small rate increase.

With Vonage you’re tied to using their hardware (with up to £39.99 set-up costs), while Localphone lets you call from your existing landline or mobile, or from your broadband or mobile Internet connection with Localphone VoIP. You can also send cheap international SMS messages, or even get an Incoming Number in your destination countries so friends and family can call you back.

As I’m sure our customers will agree, Localphone’s per minute billing offers significantly higher flexibility and value for money than competing package offers.

(information sourced from Vonage’s website on 23rd November, 2009)

As part of our ongoing commitment to reducing the cost of international calls I’m please to announce that we’ve been able to discount our rates to Nigeria by up to a whopping 20%!

As of yesterday our new rate to Nigeria is just 6.9p GBP / 9.5¢ USD / 7.6c EUR per minute to both landlines and mobiles.

You can expect to see the same great call quality despite this reduction, as the price drop reflects the growing popularity of our calls to Nigeria. As we continue to grow we’ll keep re-negotiating our rates and passing the savings on to you, so don’t forget to recommend Localphone to your friends, family, and colleagues—you can even earn free call credit when they top up!

Thank you for your continued support and loyalty. With your help we’ll keep driving down the cost of calling Nigeria and the world.

Best wishes,
Paul Cusack, CEO.

Hot on the heels of our recent rate drop to Bangladesh I’m pleased to announce even further reductions in the cost of calling.

The response to our announcement on the 1st October was so overwhelmingly positive we’ve already been able to return to our suppliers to negotiate a further decrease, and we’re passing the savings straight on to you!

You can now call Bangladesh for just 2.25p GBP / 3.15¢ USD / 2.5c EUR per minute to all landlines and mobiles. Don’t forget that for this low rate you’re getting a direct digital connection to your friends and family, giving call quality and reliability that simply can’t be beaten.

As always, the more calls we handle the stronger our negotiating position so please continue to recommend Localphone to your friends—you even earn free call credit when they start to use the service.

Thank you again for your continued support and loyalty.

Best wishes,
Paul Cusack, CEO.

To celebrate the upcoming Diwali festivities we’re announcing our new low rates to India…

These fantastic new rates are effective immediately, and there are no expiry dates, no minimum top-ups, and no other terms or conditions required to participate. It’s also not just a temporary promotion - these are our new rates to India going forward!

This latest round of reductions reaffirms Localphone’s position as the best value for money international call provider in the market. Our direct digital connections to India’s largest carriers give us crystal clear call quality that is second to none. Our ongoing commitment to negotiating better rates and passing the savings on to you means the big brands simply can’t compete.

I’d like to thank you for your ongoing support and loyalty that has made great rates like these possible. Let’s continue to work together to drive down the cost of calling India and the world.

Best wishes,
Paul Cusack, CEO.

Update: Thanks to an overwhelmingly positive response we’ve already been able to reduce the Bangladesh rate further!

Thanks to your continuing support we’ve been able to discount our rate to Bangladesh to just 2.4p GBP / 3.3¢ USD / 2.7c EUR per minute, and our rate to Pakistan to just 5.3p GBP / 7.4¢ USD / 5.9c EUR per minute.

These new low rates apply for all calls to landlines and mobiles, and are effective immediately. We’ve partnered with the largest carriers in Bangladesh and Pakistan to provide a direct digital connection to your friends and family, offering unrivalled call quality and reliability.

Bangladesh and Pakistan have always been among our most popular destinations and as we continue to grow we’ll keep negotiating for lower rates on your behalf. The more calls we handle the stronger our position is when we work with our suppliers, so don’t forget to recommend Localphone to your friends and family — you can even earn free credit when they top up.

Thank you once again for choosing Localphone to handle your calls. With your help we’re building the world’s premier international calling service and we look forward to continuing to provide you with high quality calls at market-leading rates.

Best wishes,
Paul Cusack, CEO.