Cheap long distance

[shall85296]

Hi all - after signing up for MCI's Neighborhood plan - no less than 5 times, I have finally given up. For some reason they cannot seem to get my phone line switched over. And to top it off, not one person over there can tell me why - nor do they call me when it doesn't go through. My whole family has it... I'm very bitter.
This is starting to sound like it should go in another forum... so here's my question.
In a recent thread on saving money, some of you posted about your great long distance deals. I wondered what other great, cheap - and HASSLE FREE long distance providers any of you have found.
TIA

[StaceyKim]

OMIGOD! the SAME thing happened to me. they tried, unsuccessfully, for over 1 month to get my phone switched over to MCI flat rate for all local and long distance plan (not sure if that is neighborhood). they had every excuse in the book as to why it wasn't working and to top it off i had no voicemail for over a month. it was ridiculous and made me extremely stressed out. after a month of this VERY POOR service AT&T came out with a similar plan in my area and i called and signed up for it. i had the service within 24 hours!!!!! i heard comcast also has plans as well.
good luck!

[Momof3Labs]

Depends on how much long distance you use - we use our cell phones for most of our long distance, and 10-10-987 (39 cents + 3 cents per minute) for everything else. For a while we used a Sam's Club calling card, but I get sick of dialing when using those things.

[mama2be]

MCI kept sining me up for like 7cents a minute and we'd get our bill and no joke I was charged 39cents a minute...they too claimed their machines didn't take the switch. So a good 4 hours on the phone never respolved it. Then I wondered why do their computers even have a program that accepts 39 cents a minute...are poor grandmas in the boon docks paying 39 cents a minute to call folks...who are they taking advantage of.

We pay 2.9 cents a minute all day long 7 days a week...and can use that from another phone. It was one of the greatest things we did financially was to go on the internet and order minutes from there. We actually heard about it from someone here.

It is called onesuite.com
You use your credit card to order lets say "$10" worth of minutes...well it last FOREVER!!!! And with each call it prompts you how much time you have left. With each call it used to prompt us for a "pass word number" BUT STeve removed that so now we have no "access number" to use. WE do have to dial a 1-800 number pre call, but that is so second nature now I don't even notice I am doing it. There is no connect fee, no gimmicksm no hidden charges...there is no Bill!!!, no stamps, no envelopes...all via the internet...

I feared this at first because I was afraid to give my credit card number and spend the $10 in advnace (for some reason)...BUT with theft identity a credit card is actually the best way to use your money in such a situation because you are protected...each time you send a check there is a lot of info on that check to compnaies...so why no use a credit card that you can call and complain to Visa/MC about and it becomes their problem!!!

We used our account from the hospital when Tristan was born...we love this...

[JElaineB]

Just another plug for OneSuite.com. We have been using it since March and are very happy. Our first 10 dollars worth lasted until July. You can set it up so you dial a very minimal amount of numbers to make a long distance phone call. Dial the 800 number (2.9 cents/minute) or local access number if available (2.5 cents/minute), dial the number you want, and your call goes through. You don't need a PIN if you set it up on their website. You can set it up to hear dollars left, minutes left, both or neither when you place a call. Also, you can set speed dial numbers on their web site too, once you call the access number, dial the speed dial number and your call is connected. You can even use it as like prepaid phone card when travelling. There is an 800 number for customer service but I have never had to use it yet. There are no hidden fees, taxes etc. The 2.9 (or 2.5) cents per minute includes everything.

Jennifer
mom to Jacob 9/27/02

[mama2be]

I meant to mention the no tax part...that saves a lot in itself!!!
I didn't know about the speed dialing :)...

[brubeck]

We had MCI and they would increase our rate every month and let us know by some very tiny, easy-to-ignore type at the bottom of the bill. We got fed up and switched to Sprint. Well 3 months pass and we're still getting bills from MCI so we called up Sprint to figure it out. Turns out that MCI had placed a BLOCK on our number that prevented us from changing our provider. It is ILLEGAL to do this without permission and they did NOT have our permission.

Well since I was on the phone with Sprint I gave verbal permission for them to change our provider and they did so. Less than a minute later MCI switched us BACK to them without our permission. This is also illegal. I was LIVID! But Sprint managed to switch us again and we are now very happy with Sprint.

A couple of weeks later MCI called us up and told us that we had been the victims of telephone piracy and our provider had been switched without our permission and wouldn't we like to go back to them?

You can imagine the earful I gave that poor operator! :-)