[asterisk-users] Toll-Free numbers

[Tim Panton]

On 1 Sep 2006, at 16:11, Jay Milk wrote:

> Asterisk is the least of your problems here.  You first need to  
> talk to your country's telephone operator and ask if it's possible  
> to get a toll-free prefix or area code.  IF they can, I'm sure  
> they'll charge you handsomely for that privilege -- initially, per  
> month, per call and per minute.  Next you'll need to advertise to  
> an ignorant public, get clients to sign up with you and pay for  
> this service, etc.  Chances are, if there's money to be made, your  
> country's telco would have done that already.
> Dumpolid Exeplish wrote:
>> Hi Everyone,
>>  Currently in my country, there is no toll free service provider.  
>> My company has been thinking of starting such a service (using  
>> Asterisk as a soft switch) but really we dont know how to go about  
>> this. Can anyone assist us with information/documentations, etc
>>  Thanks
>

Or alternatively, if your target maket has enough broadband users
  you could skip a generation and go straight to the future of toll- 
free :-)
and avoid having to dance to your telco's tune....

It's what I call Click-to-talk 2.0 - You add a button to a consumer
website, the button initiates a VOIP call from the user's PC
to your asterisk, your asterisk routes the call to the website's owner
over VOIP (or PSTN) and you bill the website owner for the service
and the minutes.

This contrasts with Click-to-talk 1.0 - where you ask the user to type
in a phone number, and your asterisk calls them and the
website owner over PSTN, bridging the calls. You might
choose to implement click-to-talk 1.0 until you get enough
voip capable broadband users.

Google and ebay are doing this with skype as the VOIP
technology.

If you want to know more about what we are doing in this area,
contact me off-list or come to our stand at Astricon Dallas.


Tim Panton

www.mexuar.com/cards.html