How much does your company spend on conference bridges every year? Conference call hosting, especially hosting calls between participants in different countries, can be a major expense. In these times, financial officers are increasingly looking to find ways to reduce this expense. Fortunately, there are a number of alternatives to the traditional conference service available that can dramatically reduce the cost. With a little planning, you can host cross border conference calls for as little as you pay for a domestic call. Here are four tips to help you save money:
- Use Skype. If all of your callers have a PC available to them, then Skype will allow you to host up to 10 participants on a call, and those participants can be anywhere in the world. Callers install the Skype application on their PC’s, and speak to each other using a headset and microphone. Skype is a great option for computer people.
- Use a flat rate international conference calling service. One such service, Calliflower, caps your costs at a flat $50/month with unlimited conference calls from 15 countries. Plus, it includes a host of other innovative features including document sharing and webinars.
- Have all your callers call a “free” call service. There are many free services available, which do not charge callers or organizers a fee to participate, but require the participant to make a long distance call instead. These service providers receive a portion of the price you pay to your long distance carrier. Depending on your calling plan, this may be a cost effective way for you to organize an international call.
- Avoid the use of national numbers or toll free numbers. These are high priced options that force the organizer of the call to shoulder the cost of it as well.
Bottom line: international conference calls do not have to be expensive. When cross border calling, a little research can save you a ton of money.