I’ve written this short guide as an explanation of how I’ve reduced the cost of my phone calls to the UK from around 100 Euro a month to just 15 Euro a month. What’s more, because my family and work colleagues in the UK have national call-inclusive packages, they can also call me for free.

You may have heard of Skype – which allows you to call from your computer to a normal phone for a small cost, or from a computer to another computer for free. Skype’s major problem is call quality – or rather lack of it. Plus, if people want to call you back you need to have your computer on. What I’m going to tell you about isn’t Skype – but it is based upon the same technology – voice calls via the Internet commonly known as VoIP.

If you follow these instructions, you’ll get cheaper calls with better call quality. I’ll try not to get too technical when describing how to set it all up!

What You’ll Need

To really get the best from this system, I recommend that you have the following:

• ADSL Internet – Ideally a minimum 1024kb connection for best results, although it should actually still work on a slower 384kb connection too.
• A Fritz!Box Fon ADSL Router - You can buy one of these from MediaMrkt for around 200 Euro. HOL also offer it as one of their standard routers with their ADSL packages. There are two types; Annex A if you have ADSL on a normal PSTN phone line, and Annex B if you have ADSL on an ISDN line – make sure you get the correct one for your phone line. The Fritz!Box Fon has some special functionality to make sure that Internet phone calls will always be crystal clear. It also has a socket so you can plug your normal phone into the Fritz!Box and can then make calls automatically either via OTE for national calls or via the Internet for international calls.
• A home telephone
• A subscription to a package with VoIPTalk (www.voiptalk.org). I recommend the VoIPTalk unlimited plan for the UK (£9.99 per month). This will give you unlimited calls to landlines, reduced call rates to mobile phones, and allow you to access some regional numbers that you normally can’t access from outside the UK – such as some 0800 numbers. You’ll also get a UK telephone number for callers to use when calling from the UK to you here in Greece.
• A computer. Just for the configuration. After that, you don’t actually need one to make this work.
• A credit card – you’ll need this to sign up for VoIPTalk.

What to do first

First of all, plug in your Fritz!Box Fon following the instructions supplied with it. Make sure you plug your normal phone into the Fritz!Box Fon telephone socket. The instructions supplied are pretty straightforward, so I won’t go into it too much here.

What then?

Using the subscription details from your VoIPTalk subscription, follow the VoIPTalk / Fritz!Box Fon installation instructions here: http://www.voiptalk.org/products/fritzbox-fon-setup.html

Once you’ve done this, you’ll also need to go to the dialing rules section on the Fritz!Box Fon. Create a rule so that phone numbers starting ‘0’ using your VoIPTalk subscription and numbers ‘1 to ‘9’ use the normal OTE phone line. There are a couple of pre-set dialing rules already set up for you.

Anything else?

All that’s then left to do is to try it! You’ll just need to do a few tests to make sure it works:

• Try calling a UK landline and you should get a crystal clear call – just as if you were using OTE – except that it won’t be costing you anything!
• Ask someone to call your UK VoIPTalk telephone number. You should find the phone plugged in to the Fritz!Box will ring. If your caller has a national calls inclusive package (many UK phone providers now offer this – even from mobiles) then they’ll call your UK number for free!
• Dial your OTE phone number. Again, you should find the phone plugged in to the Fritz!Box will ring.
• Finally, try dialing another Greek phone number. If that also works, then you’re all done.

And finally…

There is one final note. If you want to call UK mobiles or 0845 / 0870 numbers, or to call other International destinations you’ll need to have deposited some funds in advance with VoIPTalk. Log on to VoIPTalk and select to top up your balance then add an amount to your account. Don’t worry though, the per-minute costs for these calls are still really cheap compared to OTE.

Not from the UK?

If you're not from the UK and still want to make cheap calls, you simply need to find an alternative Internet telephony (VoIP) provider in your home country. I've mentioned VoIPTalk for our UK readers but there are many providers of these services now and you should be able to find a suitable one. You can then follow the instructions above, replacing VoIPTalk with the alternative provider you decide to use.