I've been having trouble dialling an overseas company's voice conferencing
system. I've tried several different low-tariff and VoIP carriers and none
of them get through. Finally I tried a standard BT line and connected every
time (but at a cost of 30p/min instead of 3p/min!).

At first I thought the problem was congestion, but then I realised the
problem is probably that the line has a non-standard tariff. I get similar
results if I dial a "personal" 07050 number in the UK.

This is a real pain. I have no idea which number ranges in overseas
countries have non-standard tariffs. This must be a daily problem for some
of the people who lurk here - what do you do about it? How do you work out
least-cost routes for PBXs?

I'm guessing most people either bar these calls completely, automatically
divert to a BT line if the call fails, or require a PIN to be dialled to
access them. What's usual?

--
Phil McKerracher
[url]www.mckerracher.net[/url]