They will probably charge 2c/min for incoming calls via a US number, as that's what Lycamobile US charges. If you receive calls via the UK number while in the US, it will no doubt be free.

After the recent reduction of mobile termination rates in the UK (now just £0.0069/min) I wouldn't count on incoming calls to the British number to remain free of charge in the US.

And, I doubt they would charge calls to the US number at 2c/min for roaming in Europe or the other free incoming countries.

Inquisitor, as discussed earlier, may services charge higher fees for calls to Lyca, e.g., Localphone.

Do you know if the regulated termination rates that you refer to apply to VOIP and other services, or only to calls originating from mobile networks?

When it comes to UK mobile termination, rate caps only apply at the wholesale level. No regulation is in place at the retail level.

I understand that. But, a price differential at the retail level usually suggests that there is also a differential at the wholesale level.

It's just latency in the marketplace. Your short term solution would be to port a number from O2/Vodafone/Orange over to your Lyca/Toggle or Telna/Piranha SIM(s) and the problem is gone.

Going back to wholesale termination, calls to one of the Telna/Piranha numbering ranges (+44-7418-5xxxxxx) is $0.21/minute with Google Voice (as quoted by davidtheprof in another topic) while a low volume wholesale TDM grade interconnect to the same range is US$0.0162.

It's more of an academic question for me - as much easier than porting in another UK number is simply to activate a French number which Localphone bills at 3.9 US cents per minute.

I am aware that their are other companies that do not charge extra for calls to Lyca - for example, Voipyo, a Betamax company, charges .5 Euro cents per minute. However, they do not offer DIDs with easy forwarding, and even if I set up a forward with my Asterisk it would not carry the CID information.

However, I still have to assume it is not latency/inertia in the marketplace. I wrote to Localphone about the Lyca rates, and they reduced them a bit.

My working hypothesis is that the regulated mobile termination rates only apply to certain types of call (perhaps mobile only) and that some of the carriers can route their calls to be eligible for the regulated rates (or appear to eligible for the rates), and some cannot.

That´s possible, I do just that.

Go to Betamax´s application (cannot be done through the website:(), tools --> options. Here you set "forward" "always" to the desired mobile#.

Now have Asterisk redirect calls to username@sip.provider.com

Result: CID is passed through :)

On another note, actually a question: Why doesn´t Toggle allow porting numbers from multiple countries onto one SIM? As far as I understand any given mobile# is associated to an IMSI. As such this should, in principle, be possible. What´s the holdup here?

Next thing that leaves me wondering big time: Why do they "threaten" to disconnect SIMs which haven´t been used for (only) 3 months? Wouldn´t it be more customer-friendly AND more business-oriented to charge a non-usage fee, as long as there´s credit (which might even get topped up through auto-recharge)?

My last wish, Data packages for each/all IMSIs seems to be in the making :)

However, without MNP and the fear of disconnection, I find the offer far from professional. As such I´ll keep using this as a supplementary "nice to have" gadget, rather than turning this into my one-and-only main card.

Betamax retail brands are outbound CID locked - you can either use pre-registered outbound CIDs or no CID, there's no option for per call outbound CID. Even some of their semi-wholesale brands, such as Siptraffic are inconsistent when it comes to CID.

Look around for a provider with either TDM or quality IP interconnects and your CID will work fine.

Here's the Ofcom regulated prices page: http://media.ofcom.org.uk/analysts/regulated-prices/

For these rates to apply, you need wholesalers with direct local interconnect. Those using third party or international interconnects will obviously be higher.