Calling Russia from Norway

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Calling Russia from Norway

and about cheaper international calls in general

Standard connection

How to call Russia? Dial 007 + city/area code + local number. For big cities, the city code has three digits and the local number is seven digits. You can find prices on Telenor site: here (in 2003, calls to Russia cost 2.5 kroner per minute). This is the price from the standard residential or work phone.

Quality is excellent. When I called my department in St. Petersburg and the head of department answered, he always exclaimed: "Vadim, where are you colling from? From Norway? I hear you as if you were hiding below my desk."

Calls from student villages are a bit more expensive, because the tenants there are not charged the monthly phone maintenance fee. If you can, use your work phone at the university instead.

Calls from public payphones are yet more expensive. If you feed the phone with too small change, it can die in the middle of conversation due to the lack of electricity needed to eat all your little coins. Calls from hotels can be outrageously expensive; always check the prices first.

I think, calling Russia from Norway from a standard phone is slightly cheaper than calling Norway from Russia. Calls to Norwegian mobile phones are always charged to the caller.
To call Norway from Russia, dial 8-(wait for continuous tone)-10-47-Number in Norway.

Using alternative long-distance operator

Can you call for less money? Maybe. In many countries, phone cards of alternative operators are sold. The card is nothing more than a piece of plastic with a printed confidential code hidden behind a layer of paint. In Norway and Sweden, these cards cost 100 kroner apiece. You scratch off the paint and call a number inside the country (usually it's a green 800-number), then dial the code at prompt. Then you can call any country, as long as your credit lasts (or until the card expires).

These operators probably use Internet connection between their servers in different cities and countries. This way of connecting is not very reliable. The sound quality is always low, some cities and number types may be unaccessible, line is often "busy" and so on. My most annoying experience occurred when somebody in US could not hear me during the first seconds of conversation and was hanging up before the connection could be fully established. I certainly don't recommend using alternative operator for business calls. In fact, I don't recommend them at all.

Here is a couple firms selling cards in Norway:

Gnanam Telecom Centers - no Web site. Cards "TAJMAHAL"
Global One
web-shop. Telephone cards for very cheap international calls. There is advanced calculator for the prices calculation. You can pay by credit card and to get a PIN-code and an instruction in several seconds by the e-mail.

Last updated in August 2001

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Reader's Comments

There is a possibility to call cheaper if you choose Russia to be your "Favorittland". I am not sure but I think it is up to 20% cheaper than the ordinary prices.

-- Ingmunn Eidskrem, May 3, 2002

The cheapest call to Russia and, in particular, to St. Petersburg can be made with the "Harvest" card. It can be purchased in any Turkish shop or kiosk.

-- anonymous, May 8, 2003

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