by: Bob Benson

Many people find that having and using phone cards for long distance calling simply makes sense. Whether you have employees who are sometimes out of the office or kids away from home, phone cards can have many practical uses.

If you provide calling cards for kids or employees to get in touch with you, be sure you're purchasing from a reputable company. Some phone cards are notorious for their busy signals. When you call in, you get a recording that indicates the circuits are all busy and that you should try your call again later. It's not going to do much good to page your employee only to have him or her unable to get a line to call in with the phone cards.

Think it's going to be too much trouble for your teen to keep up with a phone card? If he or she can memorize the phone card number, parents can retain the phone card and simply recharge it periodically to be sure the teen has the ability to stay in touch. If you're consistently recharging the same phone card, there'll never be a need to learn more than the one access number. If you're planning to do this, be sure that you purchase the phone card from a reputable company that will be around for you to continue recharging the card over a period of time.

For those who hang on to their phone cards themselves, there are some real advantages. Some public phones have the ability to read the cards, eliminating most of the hassle of using pre-paid phone cards.

Another positive use for phone cards is home use. If you have had trouble getting good long distance phone service at a reasonable price, phone cards may be the answer for several reasons. First, you pay as you go. There's never a gigantic long distance phone bill to hit you at the end of the month. As long as you put all your long distance phone calls on the phone cards, you'll be paying only for your basic service. The downside is that you have to jump through the hoops of dialing up the phone card number before making your call.

Remember that phone calls made with phone cards are going to give an unusual caller identification number to the recipient. If you're calling someone who tends to not answer unless they know the caller, be sure to let them know that you're using phone cards and that your home number won't show up on the caller ID.