indepenendence School of Music

Independence School of Music http://independencemusicschool.com/ offers lessons, school instrument rental, musical instrument repair, music accesories and music books. Independence School of music is centrally located in Independence Ohio to serve Independence Ohio, Brecksville, Broadview Heights, Parma, Seven Hills, Cuyahoga Heights, Valley View, Bedford, Maple Heights, Walton Hills, Brooklyn Heights, and the surrounding commuities.

Phone cards with local access numbers

Send me your phone card image, front and back, and also a poster, and we will publish it here. I am especially interested in any phone cards with local access numbers, as our readers come here to find local access numbers that are available in their home area. Let me know the top 3 to 5 countries that your phone card is best for and why. Let me know any special features, and the advertised, announced, and delivered minutes to your top 3 - 5 destinations. Let me know how your phone card performs over a single call and over multiple calls in terms of announced and delivered minutes. It is best if you itemize all of the fees. Let me know who makes the phone card, the names of the priciple owners of your phone card company, the network service provider, when it was first issued, where the phone card is available, the wholesale phone card discounts if applicable, and the online website name for retail phone card customers. Please use your real name, no anonomous posters will be accomodated. Honesty is the best policy. Placing your new calling card information here will give it national exposure of the best kind.

groove phone card local access numbers

Here is the back of the Groove phone card showing local access numbers, groove calling card disclaimers, and other information for phone card users.

Africa Plus Phone Card Local Access Numbers

Africa Plus Phone Card Local Access Numbers
Here is the actual card back for the Africa + Plus phone card. The local access numbers are visible when you click on the image. All phone cards give more actual minutes when you use one of the local access numbers.

We have also included the scan of the poster for this Africa Plus.

method music books

Method Music Books - Independence School of Music the online store for Independence School of Music has just added more than 50,000 Hal Leonard titles of our best selling print music books including popular music books as well as method music books. Sheet Music and books are now being shipped all over the world but any domestic purchase that includes two or more print books shipped anywhere in the USA for only $1.99. Larger purchases ship free. Aside from hundreds of thousands of music book titles, customers can also purchase their music accessories such as Rico reeds, Vic Furth drum sticks, Curt Mangen guitar strings, mouthpieces, and all music store accesories at a discount and get the same free shipping. All items are discounted by a minimum of 10%. Method Music Books not only ships anywhere in the world, but also has a growing portfolio of international print music.

Local Access Numbers for phone cards - international calling cards

Any company who issues phone cards for international calling to places like Philippines, India, Russia, and all over the world has three basic cost components. One of these cost is the cost of the incoming leg of the phone call. This incoming portion of the call is provided by an 800 number or a local access number or perhaps less commonly via voip access directly from someones' desktop computer.

The next component of the call, thinking of it sequentially is the switching cost itself. The switch is the computer or router or telephone system that authenticates the caller by using a pin number. It also does the accounting to debit the stored value of the pin. This is accomplished with an expensive telephone switching system, the cost of which is spread out over millions of phone calls. Alternatively the company will use a virtual switch and pay for it by paying a fraction of a cent ($.002) for example for each minute that terminates through the system.

The third component of a call is the terminating portion of the calling card minute. The phone card issuer already has a legacy network in the case of the telecom giants such as MCI, or ATT or Sprint. Thousands of smaller companies and most of the calling card companies use voip termination that is purchased from a network of thousands of small carriers operating in each country and city around the world. These terminating voip minutes vary in qualtity based upon the internet connection that the carrier uses, the telecommunications factility that the carrier used to access the local telephone network in the terminating country, the technology behind the physical equipment being used, and the expertise of the carrier.

There are of course other costs associated with the calling card business, but these three are the essential elements of the single completed or incompleted calls. Incidently, the cost is almost the same for an incompleted call as it is for a completed call.

The point of this article is to discuss the cost savings when using a local access number. Every telephone company must buy 800 access from a carrier, and all of the carriers must use and pay for some portion of the public network that keeps track of 800 numbers. Thus far there is no way around this. But local access numbers are a bit different. Since there is typically no cost accrued to the incoming owner of a phone line when a call comes in (unless the line is a cellular phone) , the calling card company does not incurs only a very small cost (compared to 800 number access) when the caller uses a local access number.

The differential between the cost of 800 number access verses local access numbers is typically about one cent to one and one half cents per minute. This may not sound like much, but one cent a minute can be 1/3 to 1/2 of the total cost of an international phone call that is using voip termination to a developed country.

This all translates to savings to the consumer because calling card companies work on only a few percentage points of profit, and will typically pass on savings to the consumer in the name of more delivered minutes. Unfortunately, most phone cards will announce the same minutes whether the calling is using 800 access or local access. Notwithstanding this fact, the switches are usually programmed to deliver more minutes when the caller is using a local access number.

Bookmark this blog because I am going to start posting local access numbers for all of the popular national branded phone cards. Since there are typically hundreds of local access numbers for every phone card, this translates into hundreds of thousands of available local access phone numbers. Phone card companies can also email me or post the backs of their phone card images here. Make sure to include details about the phone card such as the name of the phone card, the name of the issuer, and what countries the phone card is good for.

Home of the $2 phone card

I have found very few phone card websites that sell the $2.00 phone card even though many of the best selling phone cards are issued in the $2 denomination. There are a few reasons why websites seldom offer the $2 phone card. One reason is that the credit card merchant processors charge about $.50 per transaction. So as soon as an international long distance customer were to buy a low cost $2 phone card, 25% of the sale price would be eaten up in credit card fees. Most online calling card companies would loose money!



The other reason why we dont see too many online websites offering $2 or $3 phone cards is that it takes the same amount of time to enter in a $2 PIN as it does to enter a $5 or a $10 calling card PIN for an online purchase. The cost of having someone manually enter a PIN is about $.05 per PIN.



The advantage of the $2 phone card is that connection fees or disconnect fees, taxes, or whatever the phone card issuer is calling the hidden charges; tend to eat up the remainder of the phone card after the first call. So if the investment is only $2., then you can make one call and use up the minutes more easily. Usually the $2 phone card represents the best overall value.



I decided to add some of the $2 phone cards to http://www.hellocallingcards.com/ .



We are starting with Eastern Gold $2 phone card. Eastern gold is excellent for calling Ukraine, Poland, Russia, Lithuania, Czech Republic, USA, Canada, France, Germany and all of western europe and eastern europe.



African Beauty $2 phone card is issued by Clifton Telecard Alliance, CTA. African Beaty phone card is good for calling home to all of Africa.



TCI Gold $2 phone card is one of the longest and best selling phone card for calling Egypt.

Since Hello Calling Cards does not charge a surcharge for orders $10 or more, the $2 phone card is may be a great deal for you, especially if you like to make short calls.

You can see the other countries that these phone cards are good for, by going to http://www.phonecardhotline.com/ and going to the poster page.

online calling card consulting - challenges facing the online phone card distributor

Online Calling Card Distributor Competition is Fierce
There are thousands of websites that sell prepaid calling cards online. Some of these companies sell $50,000 per day or more, so this is potentially a very lucrative e-commerce opportunity. These highly ranked online phone card distributors generally have many multiple listings ranked highly on google, and spend a lot of money using pay per click advertisigng; so that the top 10 google pages for important search engine keywords include only a handful of websites such as Neblecom.com, speedypin.com, internationalcallingcard.com.

Builing Traffic for Online Calling Card Websites
Naturally one of the most common questions I am asked by my online calling card clients is How can I increase my search engine ranking? While increasing traffic to your international calling card website can be difficult it is not impossible. Online calling card distribuors can increase their traffic and their profitability to defining their business along the lines of their expertise. If you know about phone cards for calling to philippines, then concentrate on the philippines. Study this narrow market segment and learn about all of the best calling cards for the Philippines. Then try to partner with website owners who sell other types of products for Filipinos.

Credit Card Fraud
This entails more than just traffic. Business owners who manage an e-commerce website to sell prepaid calling cards quickly learn that the phone card websites are a favorite target of crooks operating with stolen credit cards. Since there is no shipping, and therefore no physicl address; it becomes very difficult to verify the customer's identity with any degree of certainty. Unfortunately many ligitimate customers use free email addresses because of their ease of use and to protect their privacy. And of course the profile of the international calling card customer is one that often includes exclusive use of cell phones, which are also difficult to verifiy. Prepaid cell phone users are impossible to verify. To make matters worse, it is easy for someone with acess to stolen phone card pins to sell these to any number of calls centers in NYC that come and go often in a matter of weeks. The fraud is so high in the online prepaid industry that many merchant service providers will not offer credit card processing services to online phone card merchants.

Rates & Prices for online phone cards - Advertised minutes vs. Delivered Minutes
There is nothing more frustrating for consumer of a phone card than to spend hours searching for the best phone card to call home, based upon advertised minutes at different websites, only to make a purchase and then learn that the advertised minutes are not right. This of course is not always the fault of the online phone card distributor. Sometimes... most all of the time... the issuer of the phone cards does not accurately advertise their minutes. Further rates are subject to change. It is a challenge for the online phone card distributor with hundreds of calling cards on their website to keep all of the rates and minutes to every country current. Once again specializing in fewer countries but staying current on those few countries allows the online phone card distributor to track Philippine land line rates, Philippine mobile rates, as well as the rates to each of the major cities.

Need Help with your Online Calling Card website?
Give me a call at 440-526-9946 or contact me online. I am affordable and ready to help.

International Directory Assistance

Some time ago I began collecting a compilation of International Directory Assistance resources at International Dialing Directory. We search for and list the international white pages and the international yellow pages by country. Let me know if you have a favorite online directory for finding phone numbers in your country so that we can include it in our list. Let me know why you think this is the best international directory assistance resoure for calling home.

Buying a phone card online

When buying a phone card online look for a online website that has a real phone number that you can call in case there is a problem. All phone card users will occasionally have some kind of problem. One reason is that all phone cards use voip technology. There is nothing bad about voip technology, thats why everyone uses it.

However, all voip is not the same. Large telecom giants such as ATT, MCI, and Sprint all use voip. These giant telecom carriers make some of their own international termination by installing facilities in other countries. To meet their ever growing demand, they also buy additional termination capacity from other carriers.

Here is where it gets interesting. A international carrier can be a telecom giant such as ATT, or it could be a guy with an internet connection, a phone line, and a router. That's it. The carrier sends the call over the internet to the guys IP address, his router processes the call, and the call is sent out through the local telephone line. The problem is that all the technology works... but quality can vary from excellent to bearly audible.

The quality is generally a direct relationship to how much the carrier pays for the terminated minutes. In order to compete in the calling card marketplace, calling card issuers tend to demand lower priced minutes from their carriers, and so goes the quality.

So when buying a phone card online or at the corner market, look for a national brand that has been around for a while. Select an online company who publishes a phone number for customer support and does not force you to rely only on the customer support number printed on the back of your phone card.

How to find a good phone card

Unfortunately there are not too many good international calling cards that stay good for a period of more than a year (compared to the number of calling cards that get hacked within the first year).

Phone card companies usually introduce a new phone card to the public by offering more minutes on the card than is profitable to do. That's right... most phone cards loose money for the first few months. Then once the user is hooked on the brand, the phone card issuer begins to reduce the number of minutes delivered for the $5 face value of the card. So while the phone card might announce 120 minutes to Philippines for $5, it will perhaps deliver only 50 minutes. Consumers will usually stay with the brand for some time, as long as the quality is good.

I would invite those of you who use phone cards to post advertised minutes and delivered minutes over a single call, as well as delivered minutes over multiple calls. If you are a distributor of phone cards, you are welcome to comment here, but please advise the reader that you are a distributor of phone cards, and provide useful information about the products you provide and about phone card misrepresentation in general.

Intele-Card Expo 2007

Now in its 13th year, This year's main event in the prepaid industry is the Intele-Card Expo to be held in Las Vegas September 18 through September 20 at Sands Expo Center. The EXPO boasts that it is the largest convention for prepaid wireless, VOIP, Payment and NextGen Technology, and prepaid distributors.

Most of the advertising sponsors for the trade show are phone card issuers. The list includes Blackstone, CAT, Oblio Telecom, Excel, Boost, Raza Communications, Cristel Telecom, Touch Tell Communications, Locus Telecommunications.

I have attended many of these Intele-Card EXPOs and they tend to be not too different from year to year. The conference sessions shed some light on the direction the industry is heading. Here are some session titles:

Loyalty cards. Opprotunites and challenges associated with building a loyalty card program (Sprinbok Services).

Fixed mobile convergence for US Hispanic - Latin American market.(Gregory Keough, DigiLinea.

Peter Dunn of Lucky Wireless is a Keynote speaker and will discuss MVNO, its key features and some sucessful MVNO methods. Josua Gordon of Red Packet Mobile will discuss marketing prepaid wireless to non-hispanics ethnic audiences. Afaq Husain of Zaztech will discuss the pros and cons of outsourcing telecom services.

What's new with stored value card programs and what is their future. Lon Breitzke will present some innovative ideas she has stored value heard, picking a bank and getting the most out of a brand.

Jennifer Tescher, the director of Center for Finacial Services Innocaation will talk on the latest trends in marketing to the unbanked consumers, those who do not have access to traditional banking services. Learn to develop a strategy for reaching these consumers who are not only unbanked, but underserved as well.

A number of sessions deal with VOIP technology. Speakers include Randall Walrand of IVR Technologies, Greg Welch of GlobalTouch Telecom, Micah Singer of Voip Logig, and Richard Kach of RNK communications. Topics include Driving revenue to the Voip network, The evolution of calling cards to IP prepaid, Deploying Voip services, and key drivers of Voip and the internet.

This is just an overview of the planned expo. For complete details or to register for the show go to www.intelecardexpo.com

I still have some time on my schedule for those who need to be able to represented at the show but don't have time to attend; or for new attendees who need a seasoned guide. Contact me at 440-525-9946

Best of Philippines

I am not sure if there are more Filipino customers who buy international phone cards to call home, or if it is just that Hellocallingcards.com has more customers from the Philippines than from all of the other countries combined. We now have more than 7000 Filipino customers who visit our website regularly, who trust our service, and our loyal customers.

Our customers count of me to know what the best products are for calling home to Philippines for both land lines and for calling to Philippines cell phones. I have added some new resources at Best of Philippines I am using the same diligence in selecting vendors for our Philippines resource page as my staff uses to find the best calling cards.

These products and services we are researching include Philippino books and literature, videos and music. We also have identified some great travel deals for flying home to the Philippines. Whether for business or vacation travel, we are seeking out great Philippine hotels and resorts.

If you are experienced in any of these areas or expert with other products and services of interest to Filipinos, please contact me. I can use your help.