I'd just like to mention that in the past whenever we have found some incredible bargain on calls to premium rate numbers, the deal has only lasted for a while and then either the rate went way up or it quit working. This happened with calls to UM and a number of other premium rate services. So, my advice to MBK is to keep a close watch on the system he has chosen, make sure it actually works and have a backup plan.

Yes, absolutely. We all have our different use cases or preferences and all the options offered in this thread are valid.

Keep in mind that the callback system I was referring to can be used with any phone. If you want you can make a trial callback call here (one of the betamax clones - warning this one is cheap to some destinations and expensive to some others - but its a good trial as all of them are using the same platform):

(registration is free, you don't have to pay anything for the trial).

http://www.voipdiscount.com/free_trial_call


Yes, it seems I wasn't clear enough in the beginning. My bad.

Thanks for the nice comment!

Yes, you are right. I also had the issue with Jersey numbers suddenly switching from €0.02 to €0.11.

The many free and other low rates have not really changed in 7 years (they are always going down), so I am not worried about them. But regarding the +372 rates, the betamax clones seem to be stable for more than a year now, adding more and more clones at the lower rates as time passes.

But of course this can change. What will I do if this happens?

• I'll still keep the +372 as primary number (free incoming/forwarding in 154 countries)
• and only trigger the callback on the 2nd local/regional SIM in the dual SIM phone.

I can't find any mention of this on the website. Are you sure this is still valid?

Update:

• Airbaltic: free UK number +4475207prefix
• XXSIM: free US number (30 days only or no expiry?)
• Onesimcard: free US number 30 days only (can pay to keep the same number)
• Onesimcard: is the only one to offer local numbers in 35+ countries
• Travelsim & Onesimcard are the only ones to offer EU data packages (10Mb, 100MB, 200/250MB, 500MB) The travelsim packages seem to be a little cheaper.

I think this is where many of us differ. We do care about how much it cost other people to get a hold of us.

The many options and variants you have described are a valid addition to the knowledge base here.
In fact, I can think of no other place on this planet where these would be more useful and likely to be used by some of the users than here.

Thank you also for your research on the +371 using group of providers.

Hello MBK,

I must agree with rfranzq on this aspect. Nevertheless I'm still very interested in xxsim. The main reason is 'best of both worlds'.

Great worldwide coverage and a normal US number for free, permanent.
So for 15 eurocent I'm done. Or even lower in combination with VOIP.

2 additions to the KB on travelsim providers:

- Why not directly at travelsim? They do not offer extra numbers
- Is the US number at xxsim permanent and free. Yes, you can even get more additional number for free such as germany and united kingdom.

At all readers:

I would like to connect my international sims to Google Voice. The issue (as decribed in the thread) is however that Google Voice goes to voicemail after 25 second and building up the connection international can sometimes take long.

So I have 2 options:
- Rebuild the whole Google Voice setup myself at Anveo (which offers US numbers with SMS and can forward sms to all numbers worldwide, for 2 dollars a month) - but then with voicemail picking up after 60 seconds.
- Have a VOIP provider "pick up" the line on time, provide a notification and then try to connect to multiple international sims - and thus bypassing voicemail.

Does anyone have experience with these kind of setups? Or suggestion for easier anternatives?

I think I now understand your problem. Your issue was at first difficult to grasp for me, this is why:

I have been living in parts of the world (including European countries), where mobile phone calls were charged ~$0.70 ten years ago, progressively dropping to ~$0.30 today.

We see it like this: (notwithstanding the fact that we see +372 as expensive, and still prefer our loved ones to be calling us for cheaper)

• when we take our car to go visit someone, we don't expect our host to pay for gas for us
• in the same way, when we take out phone to call someone we don't expect them to pay for the call for us (doing otherwise doesn't really make sense to us - other than being a courtesy, like the car point above)

But for you in the States:

1. Regulations have imposed the same rates for local and mobile calls. So as I understand, the called party is paying for the mobile call.
   
2. Furthermore, most US companies are handing out 0800 toll free numbers (whereas in our parts of the world, even the US companies' subsidiaries are less inclined to handing out 0800 numbers - they tend to be mostly offering 08xx local rate numbers - some even charge customers for high rate 08xx numbers, this makes us angry).

These 2 points seem to be the foundation of your habits of the receiving party paying for the call.

Knowing this, I can understand that people could get frustrated (even more so business contacts), having been used to calling the mobiles at landline rates forever.

So, you need a different option, of course.

Thanks for your feedback!

This is what I am thinking as well.

Oh, right! (unfortunately I can't edit the comparison post anymore).

This is a great option, indeed!

I am surprised you can't change this in the GV settings, but so be it.

The Callcentric delay is also 60 seconds.

I have been looking at the SMS issue and have tested several providers. I haven't tested Anveo enough with SMS, but to me it seems to be the only one that might be able to do it properly. All the others I tried had issues delivering messages to certain countries.

Please report back with your findings.

Anveo, Voip.ms and callcentric all can do this, and divert back to voicemail after everything else fails / doesn't pickup if you don't press a defined key to answer the call (i.ex: you hear :"Incoming call from number xxxxxxx, press 1 to take this call". If you don't press 1 it goes back to voicemail, or continues ringing other phones, as you wish).

The simplest and most convenient to use, while also being one of the top quality voip providers with highest reliability is callcentric (look for the "call treatments tab" which does what you want).

Callcentic offers less options and fine tuning than Anveo or Voip.ms, but I think it has the best interface as is easier to use for most users. (it doesn't handle SMS incoming though, but can send SMS alerts i.ex on new voicemail).

Summary: if GV is really limiting you at 25 seconds, and if you need incoming SMS forwarding, Anveo is your only reliable (?) and (relatively) simple option as far as I know.


Please come back to tell us how it works out.

Mbk do you have a web link of travelsim data packages?
Update:
Just found it.
Just tried and the 250mb package also work on my airbalticcard sim, greatt

Please note that the 4475207 free UK number that airbalticcard offer has only 0.15eur. per call surcharge!not per minute as onesimard pen numbers or xxsim incoming numbers

Great! Thanks for the feedback.