Calling Cards

FYI
Nobelcom calling cards (www.nobelcom.com) has instituted a new fee for their cards.
They now tack on a "Call Duration Fee" of $0.99 for every 15 minutes of the duration of the call.
I was informed that this "Duration Fee" was in affect for all of the calling cards they sell through
Nobelcom. There customer service number is
1-800-565-4686

Re: Calling Cards - truth (up to 900 mins/US$20) *PIC*

The best rates for calling the Dominican Republic via phone cards are the cards sold through www.BocaChicaBeach.net/staying_in_touch.html. These are mostly Nobelcom cards, marketed specifically for calling to or from the Dominican Republic.

There is no such across-the-board "duration fee", as that would not be possible. The cards offered use different carriers. If you know of any SPECIFIC card that is charging a duration fee, please let us all know, and include your E-mail address.

I spoke to the folks at Nobelcom today, and they are not aware of any such charge. The customer service number you posted is NOT to Nobelcom, according to their reps. They've never heard of it. The correct number is 800-995-2645.

Click on the link below for the best rates calling to and from the Dominican Republic. Rates for calls from the USA to the DR are as low as US$0.02/min ($1.99 connect fee) (THATS 900 MINUTES ON A US$20 CARD!) or US$0.098/min (no connect fee, 2 minute billing increment).

Re: Calling Cards - truth (up to 900 mins/US$20)

The card in question is the Nobel SOLAR card ($0.029 per minute). The customer service number is the one listed with the email pin# printout for this card. Upon asking the service rep, he informed me that this was going to be applied to all of the Nobelcom Calling Cards. If they do have different carries for the different cards offered, then this may explain why I was told incorrect info.

Re: Calling Cards - Duration fee with the SOLAR

I don't like the idea of hidden and unpublished charges showing up. I'm investigating this further and will post the results.

Re: Calling Cards - truth (up to 900 mins/S$20)

wow look i pulled up the website for that and I didnt understand what alot of the rates regarding billing meant on that chart. like billing increments every so forth minutes and rate per minute stuff and then different prices for different amount of time phone calls. how different better or worse is this card than a calling card bought from a store and how bad does it hurt your phone bill I emailed you a better profound email about this but im asking here also just in case you dont see my email. I call DR like 2 or 3 times day and just buy like regular tricom calling cards and its expensive especially since i lost my job last week but anyway let me know or at least tell me in plain english what the ups and downs of this card are like is it really just 20$ and 900 minutes you get to use in less than 90 days or are there other pitfalls i should expect like in my phone bill?

Re: Calling Cards - truth (up to 900 mins/S$20)

The calling cards work like this:

You buy the calling card. In this example, you buy one for $20.
You dial the 800 number on the back of the card (or that comes with the card number via E-mail).

You will be asked to enter your card number. You enter the secret number on the back of the card, or if you bought the card by E-mail, the PIN number you received with the E-mail.

You then enter the number you wish to call.

If there is a connect fee (for example, $199), on connection the call, your card is charged $1.99, leaving you $18.01 left on the card.

Then, you are charged for the time you talk. All charges are against the original value of the card, never to your phone bill. When the card doesn't have any money left, you are done and you buy another.

The billing increment means, for example, a 2 minute billing increment, that if you talk for 1.5 minute, you are charged for 2. They always round up to the nearest 2 minutes.

Buy these cards at www.bocachicabeach.net/staying_in_touch.html.

Let me know if you have any more questions.

Catherine...

You might be getting a better rate using the prepaid Tricom cards you mentioned - especially if you are able to dial a local access number. Generally, I have found that calling an 800 access number will cost you more. I like the Merengue cards and Tropicards (Codetel). Both have local access numbers here is Boston. $10 will get you 116 minutes to a cell phone in the DR.

Re: Calling Cards SO DISAPPOINTED!JIM HINSCH

Wow I know you don't own or work directly for this company, but let me just tell you I had such a bad experience with this card. This is the rundown:

First call 15 hours, spoke for like 31 minutes.
Second call just checking amount of money on card, said it was 16.29
Third call had $13.08 and 552 minutes, spoke for 21 minutes call fell
Fourth time I call back have $9 and 393 minutes left spoke for good hour then operator tells me I have one minute left. I hang up
Fifth time I call to see what they say they say I have $5 and 2 hours with 48 minutes left then after another hour or so they tell me I have one minute left again so I hung up
Sixth time I call to see if maybe I had money left agian I had $1.35 with no time left on card.

I mean I know you get charged two dollars each call and time u talk, but how is it that after each call I was discounted up to 200 or more minutes and then the times the card fell was out of my control and what is with the one minute left thingy if I still had those $5 left anyway. I mean I'm not fighting with you I already send these people an email because after trying to reach customer service for one hour and half and getting a machine then finally getting a live person that is what they tell me to do. But can u think of what may have went wrong ist here something I did not understand before buying the card?

Re: Calling Cards SO DISAPPOINTED!JIM HINSCH

First, let me say I'm sorry how this worked out for you. I guess I should have warned you about using calling cards with connection fees. Your experience is exactly why I never use a calling card with a connect fee. It's bad enough to get charged for time not used because of them rounding up to the next increment. 3-minutes in your case. I also won't use a card that bills in more than 1 minute increments.

It also appears that this card charges the connect fee just for connecting to the carrier, not the party you are trying to call, since the dollar value of your card when down, just for calling in to check the balance.

Note however, many people on this board swear by these types of cards for long calls, claiming they rarely experience the dropped calls. Heck, I got dropped lines even when I dialed direct using AT&T.

Calling overseas is not as clean as calling locally and yes, international calls do get dropped, especially when using cheaper carriers. What you experienced was that the connection fee quickly eats away at your card value. You sort of take your chances with this type of card.

I have no idea about the 1-minute left message you kept getting. Did it actually cut you off or just warn you? I know I've been told in the past that the "number of minutes remaining" messages are estimates, and should largely be ignored. Pay attention only to the dollar value remaining on the card.

I do need to point out that each of these cards is "rated" according to customer satisfaction, and also rated separately on call quality, ease of connection (busy signals), and customer service. Amongst all the cards offered, that card is rated the worst in almost all categories. I guess that's what you get in a 3 cents per minute call. High connection fees, dropped calls, and hard-to-reach customer service.

Finally, consider that you still taked for about 3 hours for US$20. That comes out to about 11 cents/minute, which is within a cent or two per minute of the cards that have no connect fee. Try to figure what it would have cost you to talk for 180 minutes using the Tricom card. I bet more than $20. After all, an average cost of just over a dime a minute is still a very good price for calling the Dominican Republic, don't you agree?

By the way, don't throw out your calling card. You can still use the remaining time for domestic long distance ($0.79 connect fee, then 1 cent per minute). You should be able to call across the country and talk for about 2 hours with what remains on the card, assuming you don't call from a pay phone, which has it's own service charge of $0.49.

Finally, look carefully at the details of calling cards. Many, including the one you bought, have maintenance fees. This particular one charges $0.99/week. Outrageous? Yes. But, I guess that's how they can charge 2 cents a minute to the Dominican Republic and still make money.

I'm sorry if you were misled. You can always dispute the charge with your credit card company and you'll probably win because nobody is going to spend a lot of time and documentation trying to make a $20 charge stick. American Express for example, will reimburse you themselves in a case like this because it costs them more just to administer the dispute.

You'll find that almost all the "features" (high billing increment, connection fees, higher rates for calling cell phones, maintenance fees, etc.) are shared by calling cards of any type, international or domestice, else their per-minute rates are higher. In fact, many have all these features, and still charge a high per-minute rate.

There are some calling cards that actually are a little better when used in certain metropolitan areas because they have local access numbers, but by enlarge, even with all these problems, I still have not seen a better grouping of calling cards for calling to or from the Dominican Republic. We've been over the various calling cards on this board on and off for years, and nobody has ever come up with a better card or group of cards, or when they have, the cards were restricted to being used from certain metro areas, or you have to go to some local shop to buy the card (can't just get it over the internet).

Good luck, Jim

Re: Calling Cards SO DISAPPOINTED!JIM HINSCH

yeah well about your question of whether I was warned with the one minute left or cut off when I was told I had one minute left I just hung up. But well If I wanna dispute the charge of the card on my visa, what do I tell them that I bought a calling card that was not to my satisfaction and so I wish the charges to be dropped? Won't they easily tell me that is not thier problem. I mean how do I dispute it? And well I guess I will just stick to my regular tricom calling cards for 5$ they give you 70 minutes no connection fee and for 10$ its almost 2 hours and something. But hey live and learn right no problem. At least I know now Im still waiting for my emailed to be replied heck I will probably get the credit card and pay it by the time they reply but well at least it is expected now. Thanks for the message.

Re: Calling Cards at 7 cents/min?

I don't doubt your honesty, but I'll believe it when I see it because lots of people here have made claims about really low calling card rates but the claims never pan out.

Please tell us where to buy this Tricom $5 calling card and talk for 70 minutes with no connect fee. That would be 7 cents (US) a minute, better than any "no connect fee" calling card I've seen. Codetel's card (Tropicard) is at least double that rate.

You can dispute a charge on your credit card by calling your credit card company. Tell them they sold you a product that was not as described. They will send you a form to put it in writing.

Re: Calling Cards SO DISAPPOINTED!JIM HINSCH

You must also take into account that just like your regular phone usage, all of the calls that you make are subject to the same taxes and all other applicable fees. Since you are not receiving a bill, these charges are deducted from the balance remaining on your card.

Re: Taxes charged on top of calling card rates?

I always thought taxes were included in the cost of the card and the fees quoted. I did a test by making a 50 second call to the DR, for which I was billed exactly 1 minute and for which reduced my card's value by exactly the per-minute rate. Maybe it varies by card. What leads you to believe taxes are not included?

Re: Taxes charged on top of calling card rates?

The disclaimer issued by the automated voice informing you of the number of minutes that you have available to you for the call that you are making. i.e. "You have "X" number of minutes remaining for this call . . .minus applicable fees and taxes".
Admittedly, the card that I am referring to is the Nobel Solar calling card. Since they have instituted their new rate structure, they are not the bargain that they once were. I have used the Nobel Star card before, but, I do not remember hearing this disclaimer. I will find out soon enough, I've recently purchased two of their $20.00 cards, but I have as yet to use them. The Nobel Star card is a better bargain ($$), but it also tended to produce more voice "echo". The Nobel Star card, as stated previously by Catherine, also tends to terminate your connection after a hour of use. The Star card also tended to over-modulate (feedback?) the other parties voice (on both ends). This has the affect of turning a human voice into a "computerized" equivalent, or at its worst, unintelligible noise and static.
I have experienced the same problems with the Solar card, only to a lesser degree, and to be fair, I did not experience these problems every time while using the Star card, but they did occur with more frequency and severity, to the point of my preferring to use the Solar card.
I cannot comment on the customer service of the Star card, but the Solar card service center was always available and responsive and I was never left on hold for longer than a minute or two.
I use a "Dial-around" for short duration calls (1016868 $0.19 per minute, no connection fee) and the "Echo" effect is always present to one degree or another when calling Cienfuegos, but barely noticeable when calling Santo Domingo. Maybe some or most of the problems I experience are caused or amplified due to the location/line conditions of where I call.
No matter what problems I have had with these cards, they are still the best bargain I have found, enough so that I am willing to overlook the annoyances.
Your experiences may, and probably do, differ from mine in using these cards, after all, there are only two locations that I call to in the DR.
Hope this answers any questions of why I would choose a more expensive card over an obviously less expensive card.

Re: Calling Cards at 7 cents/min?

Well the tricom calling card I buy is not out of this world i mean you can purchase them in the grocery store. I dont know where u are located but im located in the bronx and they sell them in almost any grocery store. They are pretty good as for tropicard I heard they went bankcrupt.