Today’s technology opens the door to competition in the telecommunications market, which means a better service for less money. Regardless of what your paying for your long distance calls the quality will be the same because the technology is the same.

The bulk of these calls are placed during nights and weekends with occasional calls placed during weekday hours, which means a better service for less money. Some long distance rates vary depending on the time of day that you call and this is an important factor that you should consider.

Some companies charge a small monthly fee but often charge a cheaper rate per minute, for your home or for your business. You can get long distance plans and services that fit your calling needs and your budget.

Stop paying more than you have to for long distance, and Internet services! Get the quality you are looking for without the high price tag. You work way too hard for your money these days to hand over a lot more money than you should to the big bill companies!

Those long distance calls can take a big bite out of your vacation budget. Hotels and motels will typically allow long distance calls to be made from your room, but what most people don’t know is that the rates you will be charged when you check out are often very high. The hotel will usually add on a surcharge to the regular phone rate, and this surcharge can be substantial. You may wind up paying several dollars for a phone call that would otherwise cost you ten or twenty cents. And what’s worse about hotel phones is that you may even know ahead of time how much you are going to be charged, and you’ll get a nasty surprise when you check out.

The perfect solution is prepaid cellular. Even if you don’t normally use a cell phone, a prepaid phone can be an excellent short-term solution for vacations and other trips, giving you an opportunity to know precisely how much your calls are costing you, and regulate how much is being spent.

Even if you will be traveling in a foreign country, this is still often an option. Using pay phones or hotel phones in a foreign country can be confusing, and even costlier than domestic hotel phones. When you reach your destination, check into whether temporary cell phone service is available. In some countries, you can even rent a cell phone right at the airport, use it while you are there, and then drop it back off when you fly back home.

Some domestic cell phone plans do have international features, although this will not be available in all countries, so check with your carrier ahead of time to see if you will be able to keep your regular cell phone when you go overseas. If they do offer this service, find out how much it will cost. Your normal domestic rates will not apply, and it may even be cheaper to leave your regular cell phone at home and rent one while you’re overseas.

“RIM is working closely with Nokia to provide support for BlackBerry services on the new Nokia E-series in order to provide carriers and customers with a broader choice of handsets while maintaining the many advantages of the BlackBerry architecture and infrastructure,” said Mark Guibert, Vice President, Corporate Marketing at RIM.

BlackBerry users especially will be looking at the E61, as visually it carries a very similar form factor to the traditional BlackBerry shape including the full QWERTY keypad. Launch dates for the three new models is expected around Q1 2006. Final specifications will be confirmed as we receive them.

“The BlackBerry architecture and infrastructure are recognized around the world as secure, manageable, reliable and scalable, and we are extremely pleased to broaden the choice of BlackBerry-enabled handsets with the Treo 650,” said Jim Balsillie, chairman and co-CEO at RIM.

This week has already seen the announcement of BlackBerry Connect on three new Nokia models branded the E-Series due out early next year, so it’s no surprise to see RIM spreading their wings to other key handset manufacturers, especially those who, like Palm, are primarily focused on business users and mobile workers.

The device, currently only available on USA based carrier Cingular, is a standard full QWERTY design with enhanced screen, Bluetooth, speaker phone and 64MB of on board memory. It is also something of a revolution in BlackBerry terms as the 8700 is the first of RIM’s handhelds to sport an Intel based processor. MP3 ringtone support will please those looking for some of the more standard mobile phone extras, while the Quad-band network facility will keep those all important international travelling BlackBerry users in touch with the office wherever they go.