Smart Moscow - telephones and make a call in Moscow

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Telephones and making a call

How to make a call from a Moscow telephone

To make a call within Russia, all telephones have this format: 8 (XXX)-(YYY)-(YYYY) where XXX is a 3 digit area code. It's always followed by a 7 digit number. For instance a Moscow number can look like this :8 (pause)-495-123-4567. The city code for a landline Moscow number is 495. The city code for St. Petersburg is 812. First you have to dial 8, then wait for another dial tone. Only then can you dial the remainder of the number.

To make a call outside of Russia to a foreign country, you need to first dial 8, then wait for another dial tone. Then dial 10 which indicated international access. Then dial the country code, followed by the telephone number. For instance, a call to the U.S. will look like this - 8 (pause) 10-1-212-123-4567 where the "1" following the 10 indicates the country code for the U.S.

To make a call to a mobile phone, call as if you are calling within Russia. Each mobile phone company has their own 3 digit area code. For instance a mobile call might look like this : 8 (pause) 910-123-4567

To use a pay phone on the street, you first have to purchase a telephone card, which is sold at almost every metro station. Most payphones have instructions in English. You can sometimes find pay phones on the street in central Moscow. More frequently you can find them in the Metro, close to the cashier.

How to call outside of Russia

You can usually call from your hotel room, but this will likely be very expensive. The cost could easily be $5 or more per minute.

A call through a regular telephone to a foreign number will probably cost around 20 rubles per minute (about $0.80).

You can make a collect phone call by using the services of AT&T. The AT&T access number in Moscow is 755-5042. You will be connected to an English-speaking operator.

The cheapest way to call abroad is to purchase an IP telephony card. You call a local Moscow telephone number to access the service and input your pin code. Through these services you will typically pay about $0.08 per minute to call the U.S. or Europe. My favorite card is Hello Mama! I find that they are very reliable, the system is always working and their prices are the best. You can find them at this site. http://www.hellomama.ru/HalloMama2.html

You can also have the card delivered to you in Moscow by calling one of these numbers : 8-495-585-32-57; 8-495-767-54-68; 8-909-688-33-31.

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