Help cheap ways to call home from Afghanistan/Iraq?

Mummy_Jo

My Hubby is in the RAF and will be deployed later this year. We are trying to work out the cheapest way for him to contact us at home. When he was previously deployed he only called once a week using the welfare package provided but since then we have had two kids - the eldest being 2. He wants to call home to speak to our son so he doesn't forget who he is!
We tried this when he was sent to the US for 10 days before xmas and it worked quite well only the bill came back at £124.00.:eek: I think that is more than we have paid over the five years that we have had the contract!!

He has a very old phone with Orange on the Virgin EQ tariff. He doesn't pay a monthly line rental he just gets billed for his charges. His bill is usually £2.00 a month! So, he doesn't want to be saddled with a high monthly contract that he won't use when he gets home. He gets my old cast off phones so its not brilliant for him but its ok. Although my phone is a picture one he can't send or recieve any as the contract is so old its not set up for it. He is quite happy just to have a number that is used by us when he is deployed. I'm on T mobile if that makes any difference.

Has anyone any ideas how he could call us using the cheapest method possible? Not really sure where to start.

Thanks in advance

Anon

Does it have to be mobile rather than landline (may be a stupid question if he is posted in the middle of nowhere).

Anon

Mummy_Jo

Yeah. They are in tents in the desert! There is a landline there but it is part of the welfare package and he can only use it once a week to call us. From what I remember last time he gets 20 mins a week. The queues for these phones can be lengthy, plus problems with time difference and shift patterns can mean that he might not be able to get to a phone to call when the 2yr old is awake! Sometimes they get to spend a day R&R at a hotel which means if he can get to a phone there I could call him from the UK making it much cheaper.

jo-82

Hi mummy jo my hubbys in the army we filmed him on the camcorder reading different bedtime stories what i played my son at bed time he was only 11mths when he went to bosnia for 6 mths and he recognised him when he got back

diamonds

jo-82 wrote: »

Hi mummy jo my hubbys in the army we filmed him on the camcorder reading different bedtime stories what i played my son at bed time he was only 11mths when he went to bosnia for 6 mths and he recognised him when he got back

aaaaahhhhhhhh

Meridian2uk

How is this for an idea. Purchase a "Max Sim" sim card from https://www.maxsim.co.uk (hope it was ok to put the web address in). Put it in an unlocked phone, this will give you a UK mobile phone number that your husband can take abroad with him. With the Max Sim sim card you do not pay to receive calls in many countries, unfortunately Afghanistan is chargeable at approx 60p a min, Iraq is about 32p. Back at home in the UK you could subscribe your home phone to 18866, this would mean you could could call a UK mobile (yr husband abroad with his max sim) for about 12p a min week days and only 3p a minute at weekends. This would bring your cost to calling eg. Iraq on a weekend 3p to call + 32p to receive + 35p a minute. Hope this helps. My partner is a truck driver and I have spent a number of years trying to find the cheapest route, apart from buying a sim for the country you are in, I find this works best.
Hope it helps and all the best to yr husband and family.

redux

As good as the global roaming SIM idea is for other countries, because the incoming calls are not free in these particular ones, it might be better to get local SIM cards if possible, then probably use a callback service with a lower tariff than the SIM's international calls

But I don't know if local SIMs are easily obtainable, and the network coverage will probably be pretty patchy, especially in out of the way areas like the desert.

Using Orange roaming there would be expensive though.

Ms_Chocaholic

Can you check on Ebay before your OH deploys whether any any forces personnel who have recently returned from Iraq/Afghanistan are selling their welfare phone cards on Ebay?

Ms_Chocaholic

Won't the LSSA cover the cost of calls home (is it still around £8 per day extra your OH will receive).