Phones in Halls

skeggysteve

Took Son to Lincoln Uni last weekend.

Room is OK-ish - in an 'apartment' sharing with 5 others & communal kitchen reasonable well fitted out.

But we were very annoyed to find that the 'phone line in every room' as advertised by the Uni was a NTL 0870 number - very expensive for him to call out on and us to call him on.

Is this normal?

I know we should have asked before hand but.....!

Can't find any help on saynoto0870 :-(

misskool

Some unis tend to do that for rooms in halls, perhaps you could explore other options which are cheaper, good mobile deals for students or calls over the internet?

We have to pay £5 a month line rental for our lines which I'm a bit annoyed with because I know they use VOIP for most of the calls. So I don't subscribe to it.

lightisfading

yup, i think that happens fairly frequently

Serenity

I'm in halls just now, have free internet access and phone(well paid for in rent I assume but it can't be costing me much). The phone is an 0870 number but it has to be paid for somehow so it doesn't bother me. I make sure I make all the phone calls to family etc so they aren't footing the bill for it, but its good to have for emergencies. Oh and for £5 a month I can upgrade to a local number but I don't think its worth it.

missk_ensington

What about those things advertised on the Tesco advert? You know, them phones that you plug into the computer at both ends and call anywhere for free?

I know very little about these I'm afraid but perhaps someone else can expand on this?

wigglywoozle

My sister took a Tesco Internet phone up to Uni but the internet access they have in halls wont allow VOIP so she can't use it. It's a real pain as we all bought a phone so we could chat with her.

Savvy_Sue

Never used the phone in DS1's uni hall to call him, and vice versa. Kept in touch via MSN and very occasional text or call to mobile.

Mind you, he's a geek, always online!

nalibz

try this, worked for my room last year.

Substitute the "0870" for the local area code..so in birmingham instead of having 0870 XXX XXXX it was 0121 XXX XXXX

worked for me every time..

firespire

If you don't have to pay a line rental I don't think these are very expensive (they have to make money somehow NTL did pay to wire them all in), they are less than a few pence a minute to call out and in on weekend, they are usually cheaper than mobiles unless you have free minutes.
When I found the national equivalent for a NTL uni line, I found you could only dial it from a NTL phone (and orange mobile I think) other lines wouldn't connect.

Browntoa

if he has a Laptop or Pc and internet access in his room then read this thread

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=84018

and get him to sign up for a local number (so calls are cheap for you)

get him to download the X-lite software from here

http://www.xten.com/index.php?menu=download

rather than the sipgate one, he can add a 2nd company for cheap outgoing calls if he finds one cheaper than sipgate

sipgates X-lite is limited to one account only (theirs !!! )

firespire

I'm thinking with all this equipment you might need to get for VOIP I think it is just easier to pay the 30 of whatever it costs through the room phone once a week. Sons talk on the phone for less time than daughters usually.