<p>I admit I am not technically savvy.
D is going to be in China for 6 months. How does Skype work? From her talking with people who have done this before they recommend her getting Skype credits. How does this work? Can she call us from her mobile phone in China to our home landline? Or does it have to be computer to computer?</p>
<p>We have a kiddo living overseas and we use Skype weekly. When you set up your Skype account, you will do so with a credit card. We chose $10 worth of credit when we signed up. When we get down to about $2 left, Skype automatically adds another $10 credit to our account.</p>
<p>Once you have your account set up there are a number of calling options.</p>
<ol>
<li>You can call from your computer to your daughter’s mobile phone in China. This is what we do with our daughter. An hour phone call each week costs us about $7. Well worth it. It doesn’t cost HER anything. In most other countries, mobile phone users do NOT pay for incoming calls (like they do here). This works well for us.</li>
</ol>
<p>There is some way to pay for subscriptions to countries but we haven’t done this.</p>
<ol>
<li>You can call computer to computer. If your daughter has internet access, and you both have Skype on your computers, you can call computer to computer. This is at no charge. If your daughter has sufficient band width, you can do a video skype call. If not, you can do computer to computer voice only.</li>
</ol>
<p>We have Skype on our IPad and two of our computers. It works well on all, but especially well on the IPad.</p>
<p>I would NOT suggest that your daughter call YOU from her mobile phone. It will be very costly.</p>
<p>We need to set up Skype too. For computer-to-computer calls, how ‘real time’ is it? Is there a lag? Is it just like talking on the phone, or are there tech glitches that make it more difficult or awkward?</p>
<p>Is it easy to set up? Do you have to alert the other person to log on to their computer and wait at a given time for your call to come in?</p>
<p>I just brought the old Google+ thread to the top because my son is in Italy and we had a great Google “hangout” yesterday which is their version of video conferencing. Quality was excellent (not perfect). You can actually have more than 2 different computers involved, so next time maybe I will talk to my son from my den and have my wife join us from the downstairs computer. The price is right (free). Google also has a thing called google voice that lets you use your computer as a phone and gives you an actual phone number. This service is also free. </p>
<p>He purchased a sim card in Italy for his phone that he will use for local calls in Italy. He will not be using his cell phone to call here.</p>
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<p>It is excellent real time. We have had no difficulties with “lag”. Occasionally the calls drop, but not very often. The quality is usually excellent. Again occasional echos in the background but VERY occasional.</p>
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<p>It is VERY easy to set up. Once set up, you add your contacts to your Skype contacts using their phone numbers or whatever means you will use to contact them. When you log onto Skype, the list will appear on the left with a little green icon for those who are online while you are. </p>
<p>We just arranged a time to contact our daughter. That way, she was there and ready to get our calls. There is a 7 hour time change so just calling wasn’t really efficient. Having a set time works best for us.</p>
<p>We think Skype is pretty easy to use, and works well.</p>
<p>I regularly Skype to someone in the UK. I just shoot him an email to say we need to do a Skype call. This way everything’s free. </p>
<p>The quality of the videocon session varies. It’s never what I’d call ‘great’ but it’s usually ‘okay’ but sometimes will drop and I need to do another session (right away - no need to wait a half hour or anything).</p>
<p>You can just have an arrangement whereby you or your D just text, email, or IM the other person to say you want to Skype right then. You just then start up Skype and connect. </p>
<p>All you need for Skype to work is an internet connection, the free download of Skype, and for each of you to set up your user IDs on Skype (also free). For a video call you each need a webcam, of course. Many laptops now have a webcam built-in but otherwise buy a decent quality one like a Logitech unit and hook it up to your laptop or desktop.</p>
<p>Make sure you set all this up and try it from home before she heads over there.</p>
<p>Not being technically savvy either . . .we are using skype to communicate with our daughter in Madagascar-there is insufficient bandwidth to support video while audio has a bit of lag time (to which we have adjusted). I checked with our cellphone/internet provider (a small regional outfit) and was told that, yes, this is the case with their "3G"network and they’re working to upgrade to “4G” services. As she does not have internet service with her homestay family, what works for us is to call her cellphone, using skype, at 10 PM our time/7 AM her time and talk while she is walking to school. If she needs to call us urgently, she uses her Orange phone (prepaid minutes) to call us and we call her back.</p>
<p>You can buy a skype Phone, it can be wireless. If So, just plug the phone charger to the wall, set it up with your wifi router and you can make skype-skype calls free or skype-land line with charges. When some one call your skype phone it rings just like a land line wireless phone.</p>
<p>When our daughter was in China we found Skype to be just a so-so option video wise. We could talk fine but there was not enough bandwidth to support video. That was okay though, she did a blog where she posted quite a few pictures. We had more successful skype sessions with our son when he did a study abroad in England.</p>
<p>Skype is great and the free service works fine for seeing and talking here and overseas. Both parties need to install Skype and have each other on their call list along with a webcam. We use it to sometimes chat with son in another city- better to see as well as hear his voice. Also to India for H’s mom- timing has to be when both are awake. Using a laptop you can walk around and show things in a room et al. The “a picture is worth a thousand words” idea. Son even used his smart phone as a flashlight to let us do a “telemedicine” view of his sore throat. Not sure if you should pay for any extras, I can’t imagine any benefits in doing so.</p>
<p>We use skype a lot. For $2.95/mo you can call anywhere in the US and for $12.95 anywhere in the world unlimited. Or you can do credits as noted above. We use it in the office for outgoing long distance calls to phones. H calls his mother and colleagues in Europe, his mother on her landline (thus the monthly fee) and colleagues have skype on their computers or phones (so free calls). H & his mom talk several times a week for up to an hour each time. </p>
<p>Today, I just had a committee call with 5 of us on skype that was free and worked fine, although there was an echo at the end and we were about finished.</p>
<p>I also did a conference call a while back with 18 people, 14 of them on landlines or cell phones. It worked beautifully for about 40 min. but then we exceeded the bandwidth and were disconnected. But that was because of all the phone lines. If we had all been on computers, there wouldn’t have been a problem. </p>
<p>We have a staff member who works in another state from her home. We are on skype chat every day. It’s almost like her being in another office down the hall. We do a video call once every couple of weeks. </p>
<p>Usually if there is static or echo on a video call, if we cut off the video it works better. You can always start with video to see your daughter and then cut it off after a few minutes and just continue with the audio call.</p>
<p>There is a skype app for iPhones, and assume there is one for androids.</p>
<p>Is that $12.95 anywhere in the world for all places? I thought it was more than that…going to have to check that. Do you have to agree to a year of this service or is it pay by the month?</p>
<p>yes its almost everywhere, except those are for the land lines, cell phones are not everywhere. In China, it is included in that 12.95, though.</p>
<p>So if I am calling… I need to be calling a landline? Please explain.</p>
<p>Probably not in sub Sahara Africa…</p>
<p>If you are calling computer to computer, skype is free. If you are calling a cell phone/land line from skype on your computer, there is a charge. There is a monthly rate or you can buy credits. When we signed up for the monthly rate, I recall it was “anywhere in the world”, but it is still $12.95 / month (no contract of any kind) since I’m looking at the credit card bill right now. </p>
<p>I was not aware there was a difference calling land lines vs. cell phones. When I am in Europe, H calls my cell phone with skype. However, I am charged for using my cell phone, so he usually tries to call me at whatever hotel I’m staying at.</p>
<p>The Unlimited World Subscription [Skype</a> ? Pay Monthly](<a href=“http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/prices/pay-monthly/#Index]Skype”>http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/prices/pay-monthly/#Index) allows you unlimited calls to landlines and cellphones in half a dozen countries and unlimited calls to landlines only in 40 other countries. No sub-Saharan African countries included.</p>
<p>Here is how I setup when I travel in Asia and Europe for extended time:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Pay $2.99/mo for Unlimited United States, so I can use Skype to call my clients/friends from anywhere I travel.</p></li>
<li><p>Pay $18/3 mo. for an Skype Online number in the US and before I leave, I forward my business line to the Skype online number. So, my client can call me the regular number and I will be able to answer it when I have Wifi/internet/skype.</p></li>
<li><p>As soon as I landed, I get a local cell phone pay as you go SIM card and number. I carry an unlocked world GSM phone.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>4.Activate call forwarding on the online number using the local number in step 3, if I have no skype when some one calling, it will be forwarded to a cell phone number in the country I am at so I can at least know who called. I can see the caller ID on the cell phone to screen out unwanted calls. If it is urgent, I will answer and pay for it, if not, I will return the call after I reach Skype.</p>
<p>The only thing missing from the above setup is that if I want to make a call from my overseas cell phone to the US, which so far I can live without.</p>
<p>:)</p>
<p>In OP’s D case here is how I would do:</p>
<p>Since China has land line and cell phone coverage by Skype. Setup DD’s(NOT OP’s) account as follows:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Pay $13.99/mo for worldwide calling. So she will be able to call back to US and calling any one of the 40 countries land line and China’s cell and land phones using Skype when wifi/internet is accessable.</p></li>
<li><p>Pay $18/3 mo for Skype Online number in USA so she can forward her US cell phone to China and does not have to notify her friends the China number.</p></li>
<li><p>Forward her online number to a China cell phone when she gets there so she can receive calls from the states when she has no skype.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Op just have to call her US cell phone to reach her in China. You can also have video conferencing when both of you are at the computer.</p>
<p>artloversplus- thank you for listing it out so nicely.
I am not as concerned about “seeing” her as I am to “talking” to her. It will take some adjusting on both of us as we now talk almost daily.
I just looked up the time difference. She will be 16 hours ahead of us. She will be working 40+ hours a week plus her language class. It looks like we probably are not going to be talking to her much.</p>
<p>^^ you must be wondering why skype allow calling 6 countries cell phone for a fixed fee? Well, including China and the USA, the cell user pays to make and receive call from anywhere, in other countries that skype does not cover cell phones, they only pay the minutes on outgoing calls. Receiving calls are free. Different country different financial model for cell companies.</p>
<p>“You get what you paid for”… no free lunches.</p>