Phone Card Buyer’s Guide

Brazil is a major business partner of my company’s firm. Matter of fact I might be transferring their soon for a few months. I really don’t mind because I know it’s a great country to live in and I’m especially looking forward to staying in the great cultural city of Sao Paulo.

For making my phone calls to Brazil I use prepaid phone card by Nobelcom. No surprise there right? After all they are a very reliable phone card company with the best prices. Here is a screen shot of the cards I use from Nobelcom:

Click here for more information at Nobelcom.com

As you can see there are 4 choices of phone cards with differing call per minute rates. Each card has a different maintenance fee except “1 Second Sao Paulo” which has none. I listed the maintenance fee below for each card:

• Hello Sao Paulo - .99¢ per week
• Talk Sao Paulo - .69¢ per week
• Call Sao Paulo - .49¢ per month
• 1 Second Sao Paulo - No maintenance fee

Notice the lower the call per minute rate is, the higher the maintenance fee. This detail can be found on each of these phone card’s detail on Nobelcom’s website. Most of you may have read that I frequently recommend purchasing phone cards with no fees. Maintenance fees are acceptable since there are ways around it. Which I’ll show you. The only fees you shouldn’t pay are connection fees and carrier surcharges, which Nobelcom’s phone cards do not have.

Now, the way you choose a Nobelcom phone card is by first planning on how often you will be making your calls. So say for example you know you will be making a lot of calls during a 1 week period and you’re sure you can finish off a phone card in 1 week. The best card for you to choose is the “Hello Sao Paulo”. By finishing off this card in 1 week you will have taken advantage of the low call per minute rate of 1.3¢ per minute and avoided the .99¢ weekly maintenance fee.

Maintenance fees will continue to drain the remaining value of your card regardless whether you use it or not. One note, maintenance fees only get deducted after the following week of the first time of usage. So if you bought a card from Nobelcom with a maintenance fee and never used it, then the maintenance fee will not go into effect. And most phone cards from Nobelcom have 1 year expiration dates.

Now keep in mind that all phone cards have different rates for calling a mobile number. The rates are shown below:

Click here for more information from Nobelcom

Choosing a phone card here is the same as choosing a phone card above for calling a land line in Sao Paulo Brazil.

One final note, here are some starting rates for calling other major cities in Brazil:

• Rio De Janeiro - 1.2¢ per minute
• Belo Horizonte - 1.3¢ per minute

To take a look at these phone cards for yourself or try out a Free 15 Minute Trial offer please visit Nobelcom.