Hosted VoIP

Pingo – the prepaid calling card VoIP service brought to you by iBasis (News - Alert) – is truly becoming an international VoIP service. The company today announced new added features which will no doubt make the service more enticing to international callers.

First and foremost, the service is now cheaper than ever – as the company has announced discounts by as much as 30 percent on its calling rates. For example, the company has reduced its rates for calls from the U.S. to India by 30 percent (to 8 cents per minute); from United Kingdom to Pakistan by 49 percent (to 5.2 pence per minute); from Israel to the U.S. by 24 percent (to .436 ILS); and from Canada to France Mobile by 28 percent (to .163 CAD). The VoIP service can be used in more than 35 countries. Calls can be connected to more than 125 countries.

In addition, Pingo now offers international prepaid calling cards which enable users to make payments in four different currencies - U.S. Dollars, Canadian Dollars, British Pounds or Euros. In addition users can now use their credit cards to charge up their pre-paid phone cards, making it easier than ever to purchase minutes. Also adding ease of use for international callers is the fact that Pingo’s Web site can now be read in five languages - English, Spanish, French, Chinese and Portuguese. The Web site now allows users to select one of these languages as the default for the automated phone prompts when they use the Pingo calling platform.

The service also now sports a new “Rate Listings in Multiple Currencies” feature that lets users compare rates to other services in more than 40 different currencies.

Up until this announcement, the service was considered to primarily be a US domestic product.

“With Pingo, iBasis offers consumers around the globe the highest quality and most convenient pre-paid international calling service in the world,” said Ofer Gneezy, president and CEO of iBasis, in a press release. “The world’s largest telephone providers already save money by putting much of their international voice traffic on the iBasis Network. With Pingo, consumers all over the world can also directly benefit from our low-cost, high-quality VoIP service.”

iBasis, which operates a rather extensive international VoIP network, claims its Pingo service delivers quality that is as good, if not even better, than traditional phone service.

iBasis made news on TMCnet in late September when the company announced that Telecom Georgia, the national carrier of Georgia and one of the most important telecommunications companies in the CIS, had interconnected with iBasis to exchange international voice traffic. The interconnection enables Telecom Georgia to route international calls from Georgia to the iBasis Network, as well as complete calls for iBasis over Telecom Georgia’s network in Georgia.

For more information, visit www.pingo.com. or www.ibasis.com.

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Patrick Barnard is Associate Editor for TMCnet and a columnist covering the telecom industry. To see more of his articles, please visit Patrick Barnard’s columnist page.