Hi:

I would like to know how these sites conduct business by selling
international
prepaid phone cards.  They work like this:  User enters the name of
the country he/she wants to call and this site give all bunch of phone
card plans and then user enters Credit card information to buy the
card.  In return this sites give 1-800 number and a unique account
number to make a call. This unique nubmer expires after certain
minutes of call and user has to buy online again to make more calls.

These site owners cannot buy directly from MCI, QWEST ... because MCI
and QWEST sell calling cards in bulk which these site owners cannot
afford to buy.  Therefore they go to consolidators who buy from these
telecom companies and sell them in retail.

I would like to know the following: 

1) Am I correct in my understanding of this kind of business
operation?
2) How this business works?
3) Could you please give me the list of atleast 5 consolidators?

Please let me know if more clearification is needed.

Thanks

---

Request for Question Clarification by xemion-ga on 16 Jun 2002 17:34 PDT

I've got the phone number and name of an sales individual in a phone
card web software business who can probably answer all of your
questions for you.  Would you accept this number and name as the
answer to your question?  I'm not a 100% certain he could answer all
your questions, but I would imagine he could.  If you would accept
this as an answer even if he does not end up answering your questions,
I can give you more information.  I was unable to find any other
information and it appears that other researchers did not find
anything either other than what is listed below.  This individual
would probably have pretty direct knowledge about PaylessDial.com's
business as well.  Not any personal details, but he can probably give
you an overview of the phone card business model.  Thank you.

xemion-ga

---

Clarification of Question by dreamer2002-ga on 17 Jun 2002 09:01 PDT

xemion-ga:

Please give the information of this individual and I will contact him. 

Thanks,

Rohit

This was in response to an e-mail from me:

"Hi
can you please call my at 1-866-CCSOFT INC or send me your phone
number and
I'll call you ,
thank you
Mohanad Al Sawaf
954-818-1491
sales@ccsoft.net"

My e-mail was as follows:

"Hello,

     I'm interesting in getting into the online calling card business.
 I
 found your software running a number of leading websites.  I'm
interested
in purchasing calling cards and using your software to run my website
also.
How do I go about purchasing the cards?  How much startup money would
it take?  Can you give me a brief overview of how the calling card
business works?  Thank you."

Since you mentioned PaylessDial.com, I researched their website and
e-mailed the company that made their software.  Obviously this is the
type of website you're interested in so I would recommend using the
same software if possible.

Thanks and I hope Mohanad is able to answer all your questions!

xemion-ga

---

Request for Answer Clarification by dreamer2002-ga on 18 Jun 2002 09:20 PDT

I dont think that the contact you sent me will be helpful because I
already had contacted someone at CCSoft Inc. couple of months back and
they wanted me to signup for their service (software that handles
transactions online) before they help me.  I can not go ahead and
signup until I know the business.  What I am interested in is the
business model not signing up any services.
 
Could you please give me more information or place where I can find
more information about this kind of business's model.
 
Thanks  

---

Clarification of Answer by xemion-ga on 18 Jun 2002 11:34 PDT

I apologize, from the sounds of his e-mail I thought he could (or
would) help you.  Please feel free to repost your question here:
&lt;a href=&quot;<a href="https://answers.google.com/answers/main?cmd=refundrequest">https://answers.google.com/answers/main?cmd=refundrequest</a>&quot;&gt;<a href="https://answers.google.com/answers/main?cmd=refundrequest">https://answers.google.com/answers/main?cmd=refundrequest</a>&lt;/a&gt; 
 
xemion-ga  

I wanted to know the business model.

though I did not get the answer I wanted but, xemion-ga was nice and
prompt to answer my question/clearifications

Actually ... a lot of them do purchase their time from the big
long-distance companies. They pay for large blocks of time that might
otherwise go unused. Many more simply start their own long distance
companies. Since deregulation of Ma Bell, nearly anybody can set up a
long-distance service provider business by filing the appropriate
paperwork the the FCC, all they need to do is purchase the phone
switching equipment (or lease it from a local RBOC) and have the local
owners of the phone lines hook them up. They pay a fee to the company
that owns the lines, and they pay appropriate switching fees to the
other operators where their calls are relayed through. All you need
from there is a database to manage your blocks of time, customer
accounts, etc. and that's it.
You could realistically run such an operation out of a closet in your
house. It will be small, of course, but very possible.

The kind of operation you are talking about will cost you millions of 
dollars.

kamnet-ga, thank you for your comments.  But do you think that these
businesses are running like the way you mentioned, for example
"www.paylessdial.com" and many more? If you type "phone cards" on
google search you will find thousands of companies.
What I heard from one person (may be an owner of that site I am not
sure) is that they buy in bulk from consolidators an then sell online.

The procedure you mentioned seems bit complex (I may be very wrong
because of my inexperience in this industry) and I have a feeling that
these companies do not go thru this process.

Could you/anyone else please comment on this.

Thanks

It doesn't require millions of dollars, and it really isn't all that
complicated. You file your paperwork and filing fees with the FCC.
Your chances of approval are very high. You call the sales office of
your RBOC and they arrange to hook up the phone lines running into
your location. The equipment will probably be the most expensive fees
(a few hundred-thousand), but telephone switching equipment is not
difficult to obtain. Your RBOC will take care of making sure you get
billed from all the other carriers for carrying your call from Point A
to Point Z, your customers pay you and then you pay your exchange
carriers.

As they say, there is more than one way to skin a cat. Using
consolidators is certainly one way of doing it. You might be able to
find more information at http://www.thedigest.com/ - an industry
newsletter which targets the long distance reseller market (which
would be what you're looking at, technically).

There are four different levels that you can enter the phone "card"
business at... The first being the super buyer level (the
consolidators).. here you purchase minutes from the large carrier
companies, set up a call management system and spend at least a
million dollars on routing and switching systems.. You finally print
cards with PIN #'s on them which you sell to the second level of phone
card vendors....

I run a phone card business at the fourth level on my own website.. if
you would like to get a complete grass root level information on this
business, i could provide it as an answer...

Regards

professional-ga:

thanks for your response. I would like you to provide me more
information as an answer but I dont know if two people can answer my
question and also whether I will be charged twice to get the answer
from two people?