Q We have been spending an increasing amount of time in our French property and hope to retire there permanently within the next year. Our family however will remain in the UK and I fear the cost of my weekly catch-ups with my daughters. These phonecalls are an institution in our family and I would hate to have to forego them because they are too expensive. Can you offer any advice?
Mrs JM Lowe
A In an age where flights can be picked up months in advance at staggeringly low prices, it is frustrating that it can cost an arm and a leg for your family to call you from the UK or for you to take their call in France on your mobile once you are happily ensconced in your maison secondaire..
Costs can be confusing when you try to dig deeper on the subject, but a quick call to BT customer services will confirm that it will cost you 30 pence per minute to call a French land line and 51 pence per minute to call a French mobile number from the UK. Obviously that cost is reduced to around 10 pence per minute if the person you are calling is using their UK mobile in France, but instead they then get hit with the higher cost because they pay to receive the call – between 30 and 90 pence per minute on the main UK mobile networks.
Looking at the situation from the French perspective, it is much the same. If you have managed to set up a land line at your property with France Telecom then you’ll certainly be saving when you call the UK compared with using a UK mobile. You’ll be paying around 23 pence per minute by using a French land line to call home compared to the roaming charges that apply when using your UK mobile – these vary between 60 and 85 pence per minute on standard rates for the main UK networks.
Recently, savvy travellers have managed to find on-line alternatives with simple searches conducted through the main internet search engines, like Google and Yahoo. Many have adopted a local mobile solution in France by taking up a French contract or buying a pay-as-you-go SIM card. Using a French SIM in your mobile will mean that you avoid the roaming charges and can therefore call home at rates of around 30 pence per minute and receive any calls for free. It is worth noting that you may have to pay to unlock your phone so that it accepts other SIM cards.
Similar on-line solutions exist for land lines – both in the UK and in France. Using a dial through service can mean calls to a French land line through your own BT phone cost only 2 pence per minute, while the call from France to the UK on a France Telecom land line reduces to 3 pence per minute. Calls to a French mobile can also be re-routed through these services achieving similar savings. Dedicated technophiles can even set up dedicated VOIP (making calls via the internet) services in France for accessing free calls to fellow users anywhere in the world.
There are many other useful on-line resources such as the trade association of the world’s 700 GSM mobile networks – they’ll offer immediate on-line advice on the cost of roaming with your current plan, at least giving you a start point for further investigation. Ofcom also closely monitor all UK service providers and can be used to gather facts and figures as well as to receive complaints if you feel you have been unfairly charged for services provided whilst abroad. Using the same internet searches that you use for flights, ferries and car hire can uncover some great savings when communicating while you’re away, so don’t accept what you pay now – an alternative solution is only a few clicks away.
Angus MacLeod is director at 0044 Ltd, a communications company offering low-cost solutions to making calls to and from France. For more information, call 0870 950 0044 or visit www.0044.co.uk