IDT Looses Appeal on Lawsuit by Former Executive

Alfred West, the current President & CEO of Xchange Telecom, Inc., had originally filed suit against IDT for what he claims was a breach of contract when he was forced out after only 6 months of employment (Feb 2001 to August 2001). West presented a handwritten agreement that he had signed by Howard Jonas which was reportedly to guarantee him 15 million over the life of the deal. It appears as if West, a former executive at Econophone and Viatel was given the promise of emplyment in exhange for brinign his contacts and much of the Viatel buisness and property rights on board. From what IDT contended, Wright falsely promised the rights to things he did not have any ownership of so therefore they let him walk and was the preliminary defense IDT used.The original decision was in favor of IDT claiming that he did not have sufficient right to be paid the remaining un-worked period of the contract but a court of appeals has just overturned this decision and sided in favor of Mr. West. If all stands up IDT will be forced to pay up.

To view the full court of appeals document click here

Blackstone Got Out of Trouble

Blackstone, a telecom company, has successfully fought the fine that the FCC brought against them. On February, Blackstone was charged with a $20,000 fine for failure to register with the FCC and pay the appropriate USF (Universal Service Fee). The Bureau is claiming they have made repeated requests of Blackstone to get in line and register but have received no response from Blackstone and no cooperation.

Blackstone apparently ignored requests from the FCC asking them to file and make certain types of paperwork available because they felt they are not a service provider, just a phone card distributor, so therefore there was no need to file. Like many other prepaid calling cards distributors, they have made claims as such to their end users (common practice).

While the $20,000 fine may not look like a lot, the amount was actualy increased significantly from the base fine for this type of infraction due to Blackstone's complete lack of response or cooperation with the Bureau. However, Blackstone has since provided the paper work proving that they are not a long distance carrier, just a distributor, and as a result the $20,000 fine has been removed and the matter dropped.

Source:
http://www.fcc.gov/eb/Orders/2007/DA-07-3235A1.html

Pizza & Phone Card Combo

A pizza chain out of Texas, Pizza Patron, will begin selling unlimited Mexico calling cards in all of their restaurants. The service is provided by BlagCard(TM) and the calls are mainly carried by at&t. Pizza Patron currently has over 60 stores in Texas as well as in a few surrounding states, with another 40 or so chains set to open within the next year.

Cards will be sold in $5, $10 and $30 denominations, delivering either 2, 7 or 30 days of unlimited calling to Mexico.

While the press release does not say if these cards will be available with delivery of a pizza, it is an interesting concept and truly a unique partnership the likes that this industry has never seen before.

Source:
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/07-23-2007/0004630312&EDATE=

International Calling Destinations on US Phone Cards

Below are the top called country from continental US on 2004. Although it's not up to date, but the data hasn't changed drastically, and still reflects the current market.


Breakdown by Continent:
North and Central America = 30% (this has no doubt decreased since 04)
South America = 19% (this has no doubt increased since 04)
Western Europe = 13%
Asia = 10%
Eastern Europe = 7%
Caribbean = 6%
Africa = 6%
Other = 9%


Breakdown Of Minutes Made Using US Calling Cards by Country:
Mexico 2,033.3 million minutes
Canada 948.9 million minutes
Columbia 801.3 million minutes
Brazil 629.6 million minutes
UK 489.5 million minutes
Dominican Republic 489.0 million minutes
El Salvador 406.7 million minutes
Guatemala 361.5 million minutes
India 331.4 million minutes
Germany 293.7 million minutes

IDT Telecom Cuts Back to Cover Loss

On Wednesday, June 7, IDT announced their 3rd quarter results and the picture looked bad. Their net loss, 15.9 million, was nearly double that of Q3 from 1 year ago (8.6 million). Revenue was announced at $485.4 million down from $547.2 million 1 year ago.

This seems to have caught many off guard as most analysts, who up until Wednesday had IDT stock as "hold," quickly changed their recommendations to "sell." While IDT officials kept up beat and political during the announcement, they drew no detailed plans of how they were going to turn the company around. Instead they kept blaming the poor performance on "the unfair business practices" of other calling card companies, a point of contention for them and the subject of an ongoing lawsuit.

As a result of the loss, IDT announced during their earnings call that they have just cut 300 jobs from the Telecom division. Add this to the 570 or so jobs cut in late summer last year and the company is pushing almost a 25% reduction in its work force from last year (Yahoo had IDT listed at 4,000 employees up until last week when they adjusted this number to 3,000).

Source:
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070606/earns_idt.html?.v=1

AT&T Wireless Adds More Flexibility to Prepaid Cell Phone Plans

America’s leading mobile phone carrier, AT&T Wireless, is making a new slate of calling and messaging features available to prepaid cell phone subscribers, in an attempt to make its GoPhone Pay-As-You-Go offering more flexible and competitive.
AT&T’s prepaid customers can now buy 3,000 additional Night & Weekend minutes at a fixed cost of $19.99/month, or 200 text and multimedia messages for $4.99. Mobile data bandwidth is also being offered on a prepaid basis, costing $9.99 for 5MB.
Prepaid airtime can now be rolled over from one month to the next, provided that a customer renews his or her services by the end of each 30-day billing period.

Source:
http://www.teleclick.ca/2007/06/att-wireless-adds-more-flexibility-to-prepaid-cell-phone-plans

Korea Prepaid Phone Cards get a Boost with Korea Travel Cards

Travelling in Korea has never been easier for visitors who take full advantage of the Korea Travel Card (KTC) which alleviates the need for cash while travelling in Korea. By using the KTC tourists don’t need to worry about currency exchange and can use the card for shopping or paying for accommodation, dining or sightseeing while travelling in Korea. The KTC is accepted in almost three million credit card member stores.

There are also benefits for visitors including up to 90% discount on domestic and international calls, free travel insurance, preferential currency exchange rates and additional discounts at special discount member stores, and much more.The card allows visitors to purchase theatre tickets up to 10% off at certain theatres like Nanta and Tokebi Storm and the Chongdong Theatre, all shows with a Korean flavour which are popular with foreign visitors. Discounts are also available at KTO Duty Free Stores.The KTC can be purchased in amounts of W100,000, W200,000, W300,000 and W500,000.

The card can only be purchased in Korea at Shinhan bank locations, Chohung Bank, Jeju Bank or the tourist information centre in the Korea Tourism Organization Seoul headquarters. Some tourist attractions on Jeju Island offer up to 40% off the normal entrance fees. While on Jeju Island you can visit the Folk Village Museum, Jeju Love Land, Happy Town, Hot Air Balloon Theme Park and a host of other unique attractions at special discount rates. Aside from the Travel Card there is the KTC transportation pass which is a multipurpose card with all the standard features of the Korea Travel Card with the additional feature of using the card as a transportation pass as well.

For travelers visting Seoul who enjoy a spot of gambling the KTC Seven Luck Card will be useful. The Seven Luck Card is an electronic gift certificate which is prepaid and multifunctional including the function of a calling card. With discounts available at affiliated stores such as Lotte Department store, you can also use the card to exchange your lucky mileage points for a KTC Seven Luck Card, which can be accumulated whenever you visit Seven Luck Casino.

For more information on the Korea Travel Card, KTC Transportation Pass and KTC seven Luck Card visit the official Korea Tourism.

Source:
http://english.tour2korea.com/06shopping/KoreaTravelCard/ktc.asp?konum=subm1_1&kosm=m6_4

Prepaid Press Virtual Conference & Expo

The Prepaid Press, a regular news paper publisher for the prepaid industry, decided to start a "Virtual Expo" rather than host one in a hotel or convention center. They claim it is a great thing that will allow you to participate, view and contribute at your own schedule. The seminars will be available for days after they have first been conducted and the virtual exhibit hall will also be up and running for weeks.

It must be nice to attend a conference in PJ ;)

Phone Cards Guide

What is the Future of Prepaid Phone Cards?

While most of us will no doubt agree the prepaid phone card boom is well behind us, but the real question now is what kind of future does the prepaid card business hold?The answer, seems to be clear by the fact that the once powerful companies, like UTA and STI are just not doing well. Sales of prepaid cards are at an all time low and I think the market was just so badly managed and abused that the customers are more willing to try other methods of long distance calling, like with prepaid cellular phone, VOIP services (Skype/Vonage) as well as traditional long distance. The idea that the average prepaid phone card customer is credit challenged and prefers cash business is changing and more and more immigrants are either becoming more credit enabled or now have the means, through prepaid cash cards and other debit systems, to buy more mainstream services. Immigrant consumers are more educated and technology savvy than they were 5 years ago and the rates that Ma Bell and VOIP players are offering today are so low that it is almost no wonder why a lot of people are turning away from phone cards.