I have been using Voipcheap for free calls over the internet since last Christmas and have been very happy with them.

However, without warning I have just noticed they are charging £0.01 per minute on UK landline calls, even though the rates page of their website shows that calls to France and the UK are still free. I have emailed them but do not expect an answer!

They now appear to charge 1p a minute for all the countries which have been free until now.

I guess there's no longer such thing as free lunch!

Now need to choose between Voipcheap or 1899 depending if call likely to exceed 3 minutes!

Calls are still FREE. Read this thread.http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=252980

I am sorry I did not make it clear.

They have charged me at 1p a minute for UK landline calls today and have deducted 1p a minute used from my credit. I have only made 39 minutes of free calls in the last 7 days so I have not exceeded their allowance of 300 minutes.

They are ADVERTISING free UK calls but are CHARGING 1p a minute.

That is the point I was trying to make.

Have other people experienced the same treatment?

sirp2000 wrote on Aug 29^th, 2006 at 3:45pm:

I am sorry I did not make it clear. They have charged me at 1p a minute for UK landline calls today and have deducted 1p a minute used from my credit. I have only made 39 minutes of free calls in the last 7 days so I have not exceeded their allowance of 300 minutes. They are ADVERTISING free UK calls but are CHARGING 1p a minute. That is the point I was trying to make. Have other people experienced the same treatment?

i have the same issue they have started to charge me 1p for national calls in the uk. if you join up via .co.uk site then they now charge you if you join up via the .com site its still free.

Voipcheap.co.uk has now changed its rates page and both UK and France landlines are shown as costing 1p a minute.

Voipcheap.com, whilst the advertising panel shows a list of countries to which calls are allegedly "free", the rates page now shows that charges apply to all destinations. UK landlines are shown as 0.93p a minute.

So as expected, they have discontinued their free calls. I will continue to use them until my credit runs out and will then take stock of what is available. At present, 1899 (3p a call) will be best for long calls.

Voipcheap.com still free anything that says super deal is still free you are only charged for going over your free mins.

sirp2000 wrote on Aug 30^th, 2006 at 4:32pm:

Voipcheap.co.uk has now changed its rates page and both UK and France landlines are shown as costing 1p a minute. Voipcheap.com, whilst the advertising panel shows a list of countries to which calls are allegedly "free", the rates page now shows that charges apply to all destinations. UK landlines are shown as 0.93p a minute. So as expected, they have discontinued their free calls. I will continue to use them until my credit runs out and will then take stock of what is available. At present, 1899 (3p a call) will be best for long calls.

Lots of useful tariff info here:  
http://www.myvoipprovider.com/Free_VoIP/

I thought I had a similar problem with voipstunt as they blist uK land as free, but on the rates page it is 0.93p.
However I can verify that the calls are still free. I watched the account and the only deduction has been the connection fee (I use callback). But the bit to watch is this fee as it seems to have gone up to €0.05 from €0.03. This did fluctuate between the two for a while, as some may have read in another forum, but it now seems static.

As others have said, I believe they are displaying the rate that would be charged IF you exceeded their allowed minutes. For UK to UK this would obviously work out far more expensive than 18185 or 1899, but for the international calls there can be no grumbling.

Read this earlier today 06 - 09 - 06

http://www.myvoipprovider.com/Free_VoIP/

NEW - In the last week of August 2006 the Betamax group changed their credit expiry policy (probably due to legal requirements in Germany). They now offer so called "Freedays". Any credit in your account will now no longer expire. After the 120 (90) "Freeday" period the calls will be charged at the rate published in their rates schedule. Should you however add funds to your account before your credit expires then your total credit will remain valid and your "Freeday" period will be extended by a further 120 (90) days.

Edited

Just found this site, apologies if it's repeated info.
http://backsla.sh/betamax

They capture and process all the price info from the various Betamax voip programs. Well worth a look.
Apparently updated daily.

I downloaded voipcheap from the 1899 website as it promises free calls. However it seems that the calls can only be of 1 minute duration unless one pays and then its free for 120 days. Clearly their definition of free is not the same as mine. Can anyone explain how it works. I tried the free trial and it seems to ring to a landline ( no one was in to answer) and would appear not to need special equipment.Does anyone know what the minimum payment is?It seems very similar to jajah without the need for  the party called to be a signed up member.All info gratefully received

I use VOIPSTUNT, ( http://www.voipstunt.com/en/index.html ), a sister company of Voipcheap, the free calls, to a UK landline, last 4 minutes and 59 seconds, not to sure how many you get, but eventually you get a window popping up telling you that you have reached the end of your free calls and asking do you want to purchase credits, I just click no, then remove Voipstunt from my computer, then go back to the website and download again and start again, I have been doing this for about 6 months now, although i do not abuse the calls, i.e using it every day, so I do not know if you do use it for lots of calls they may cotton on.

Does it work for NGNs

reggie wrote on Aug 5^th, 2007 at 2:15pm:

Does it work for NGNs

No you need to pay for them, as well as mobile numbers, so you would need to credit the account, not sure as to the cost of those numbers, but I would assume they will be on the site somewhere.

http://www.voipstunt.com/en/rates.html
united kingdom (Landline)      FREE*
united kingdom (Mobile)        0.145
united kingdom [0845 rate]      0.032
united kingdom [national rate]  0.080
united kingdom [personal]          0.145