Truphone at first sounds too good to be true — VOIP on your iPhone. So, is it like SkypeOut, which is very close to free? Well, not exactly. When you download the app, you are given a free $4 to apply towards any calls, international or domestic. Since truPhone does not ask for your credit card, you might assume that it is a free service. You would be wrong. Once you use up the $4 credit, you need to go to the TruPhone website to “fill up” your minutes.

For international roaming, the pricing here is attractive, at 30 cents a minute for mobiles and 6 cents a minute for landlines. This compares to 99 cents a minute for ATT, even under the International World Traveler plan. For domestic calls however, using TruPhone will actually cost you money, especially if you have a high 6000 miute / month plan like me.

Using TruPhone is as simple as clicking on the app, and then clicking on a contact. You don’t need and are not given a separate phone number, so, unlike Truphone for Nokia, you cannot really make the free TruPhone to TruPhone calls just yet. And, due to service restrictions with ATT, truPhone will only work over a wifi network, not edge or 3G.

Although it does the job, there are a few ways in which this app is still very much “beta”. Loading the contact list takes a few seconds, which is fine if you are going to save yourself a few dollars, but annoying nevertheless. Also, if you do want to purchase additional minutes from the company, the process is extremely complex, requiring you to type in a 10 digit alphanumeric password at least three times. Since its so new, we will give the company the benefit of the doubt, but we will check in soon to see if the situation is improved.

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category: Travel