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Hotel Telephone Charges - and how to avoid them...(cont.)
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Utilize pre-paid phone cards
(which you can pick up from most convenience stores in many countries
but make sure that you read the fine print). One of the main benefits
of using pre-paid cards is that you already know how much you’ve
spent on the calls and you can set a definite budget on your spending
when it comes to telephone calls. |
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With these kind of cards however
you may still have to use a phone in a public location nearby
your hotel as the hotel may probably charge you service fees for
accessing the ‘freephone’ number from your hotel phone.
In that case you’d be paying twice for the same service
and that’s not good in anyone’s book.
See if your home telephone
supplier has a ‘calling card’ scheme whereby any calls
you make are billed back to your home telephone account.
Depending on where you end up staying, and the nature of your trip,
you could also consider renting a mobile phone for the duration
of a day or for however long you need. If you have many local calls
to make then this could turn out to be a good investment.
See if the hotel has a lobby phone that you can use for local calls.
This might not be practical for many types of calls, but it might
do if you’re simply making the occasional local telephone
call.
Of course these suggestions have their own inherent costs associated
with them, but you may find that they work out cheaper in the long
run if you intend to make a number of calls or if you make one or
two lengthier or long distance ones.
Have a look online before you check in. Most hotels these days have
an online presence including hotel charges. If they don’t
offer the charges online, drop them an e-mail in advance. Much better
to spend a bit of time before you travel than having to queue up
at the hotel front desk just to find out information about their
telephone charges when you actually get there.
The bottom line of course is that we all know that hotel telephone
calls are going to be expensive, but there is a lot that you can
do to make sure that you are not incurring unnecessary expenses
and to keep your hotel bill as painless as possible.
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