ashug76

We will be travelling to France, Italy, Switzerland & Netherlands. What is a good phone card / calling card that can be used to call international from all these countries? Any help will be much appreciated. Thanks.

enzian

In Switzerland, we just put a credit card (VISA) right in the SwissCom phone. The display shows the charges (in Swiss francs) and it is accurate. Most of my calls to the western US ended up around $1.80 to $2.40. You could also buy a 5-franc phone caard at the post office, but when I did that I ended up with money left over.

JudyC

It would be very much cheaper to buy individual phonecard from newpaperstands in each country, usually a 5 Euro card last for more than an hour.

ira

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hopingtotravel

Can these cards be used from your hotel room, or only from a pay phone?

xyz123

They can be used from a hotel phone but what you have to check out is whether the hotel surcharges the call to the network to trigger the call..some do and osme don't.

WillTravel

I am afraid to use hotel phones for any sort of free number, even if given every assurance.

One hotel (in California, but still the point applies) claimed that the free prefix had not been programmed into their system, so I was charged at the long-distance rate.

So I just get a phone card from the local corner store type place, using the clerk's recommendation. The "official" payphone cards give you barely any time at all for long-distance calls.

Don't forget - if the payphone accepts coins, which of course not all of them do - you can also put in a Euro or so and make your call. This is not as good a deal as a phone card, but still better than being charged long-distance from your hotel room.

Another option is that some Internet cafe places have closed stalls where you can make long-distance calls for a few pennies per minute.