Help I can't keep paying this every month!!

[AnArkIsAFineVessel]

Help ! My house phonebill is in again today and another £117 for the month . This is due to having no mobile signal where we live and constantly having to use the landline to call mobile numbers . I am old and clueless on such things but my nephew tells me I can use my Internet connection at home with my iphone to make cheap phone calls ? I remember using Skype years ago to call international but cannot find how much they actually charge for calls to uk mobile phones.
Is Skype still good or is anyone else out there better for this ?

Have you checked all the mobile networks to make sure none will work where you are? My mum lives in the middle of nowhere, and can only get a signal on O2, she spent years on Orange thinking she just had to go for a 10 minute walk out of the valley to be able to ring anyone

If you go into a 3 shop they will check out the coverage for your area ? Could you text as opposed to call ? or use Whatsapp as this gives you free texts and picture messages no matter what network you are on.

No network at all here. Have tried them all with the aid of friends phones. The best is tmobile-orange which gets 1 bar whilst hanging precariously out of the bathroom window to send a text . The village is in a huge dip in the valley hills all around us so I don't think we have a hope with any mobiles unless some kind operator builds a transmitter in the dip( which for around 200 people is probably not going to happen) I also am tied into a flipping contract with O2 for another year which I have to pay signal or no signal. I have1500 minutes a month just being wasted now

How about a signal booster?

Well you could reduce your home bill by making less calls!

Looking on the BT site a 5 minute call to a molbile is about £1 and an hour is still less than £7.

If you are 'old and clueless' then presumably you grew up in the time pre mobile phones when people did limit phone calls due to cost.

I can use my home phone in connection with my broadband and it is free it does have a different tele number though, I have my service through BT and with calls/internet/and BT Vision pay average £50.00 per month I never use the house phone for mobiles and have a service where I pay £4.70 a month for all calls up to 1hr,the charge also includes my internet security system so I get a really good deal.

I have to make the calls for work! I am provided with a mobile phone which is paid for, I am supposed to use that for all calls relating to work . They will not pay towards my home phone bill as they provide me with the means to make the calls at no charge to myself and suggest I drive 2 miles up the hill to use the provided for me mobile. I do as many as I can whilst out but the few I am doing from home is really adding up .DS1 also rings his dad a lot who doesn't have a landline phone . So I am stuffed basically , the calls have to be made I'm just looking for a way around paying hundreds of pounds in charges a month. Even if I could get it to around the £70 a month it would be liveable with. I will look into a signal booster thank you , had never heard of one

You should also ask your current phone supplier, and some others, what packages they have with inclusive calls.

For example, I have a Post Office line with free evening and weekend calls including mobiles and overseas and it costs less than £15 a month

They just get the line transferred from BT

I hear Tesco and Utility Warehouse also give good phone deals, and came out well in "Which but there will be lots of others.

If you live in a town there might be a Cable company like Virgin with a special deal for combined phone, broadband and mobile (I think they have a tie-up with Orange)

If you are old, go into the library and ask to read the Which repoorts on home phone services.

DS1 should be getting his dad to ring him (my mum and me agreed that she would one-ring me from her home phone as it only charged her once the call was answered) and I would ring her back as a landline number is part of my inclusive minutes.

If its costing you so much for work calls, I think I'd go and park myself in a corner of a cafe most of the day and work from there, I'd prefer to spend the money on coffee rather than phone calls

Can't you use your broadband service to make the calls it's easy to set up and free for calls thats the best solution I think.Get DS1 to text his dad and ask him to ring him is that possible?

p.s.

Which also recommend using www.18185.co.uk on your existing line

Call override services do not require you to sign up to a contract.
There is no monthly fee for these services you only pay for calls.

pps

It looks like the current rate is 6p a minute to ring mobiles.

I'm with sky for my phone and broadband . I was with BT I remember having an "Internet " phone with them too! I think I need to go and do some research whilst trying not to ring colleagues as thats where most of the calls are going to. They have the NHS mobiles that obviously work for them even though most of them are in the wilds too I am actually so old I still subscribe to which !! Have done for years I will have a good look through the website on there too . Thanks for your help hopefully I can get this down a bit as handing over a hindered pounds a month is making me itch

"Call override services do not require you to sign up to a contract."

but services like 18185 (or 1899, which I use) can be blocked when the company handling line rental and calls is other than BT. Sky, TalkTalk and others can (at their discretion) block access to 'indirect services' and do

I'm using Primus (line rental under 9 quid) and 1899 for calls (5p per call to 01/02/03 numbers, around 10p/min to mobiles, but I use a mobile for those).

Sorry OP, if none of the networks provide a good signal, that's the source of your problem (along with cost from Sky). As someone else said, calls between DS and his dad are something for his dad to cover, if necessary with a SIM-only deal from Tesco (uses O2), O2, or one of the other mobile networks.

I get 600 minutes a month on a 15 quid/month deal from Three (it's their "SIM 600" on a 12 month contract, giving 600 minutes, 3000 texts and unlimited internet), but there are cheaper deals for just voice and text, and of course even texts to your landline will work - if you have a cordless phone that can accept SMS or if not, there's a text-to-voice service so DS's dad can type in the message and it will be spoken on the phone at your end.