Tiscali launch Netphone service

Internet big hitter, Tiscali has entered the broadband telephony market with the launch of free download, Netphone.

The service enables anyone with a Tiscali email address to route voice calls for free to other Netphone users, make low cost calls to national and international landlines and mobiles, send and receive faxes and send text messages. Crucially, Netphone can be used even if you don’t get your broadband from Tiscali. Before downloading the software, non Tiscali broadband users can take advantage of the Netphone service by registering for a free Tiscali email address.

UK call charges are 1p per minute to landlines and from 12p per minute to mobiles. International calls start at 3p per minute, including the most popular call destination countries, the USA, Australia, France, Germany and Spain.

Netphone's text message service, meanwhile, costs 6p per message sent to any UK mobile phone, while faxes are free to other PCs or 10p per page to a UK fax machine.

Users can also manage their inbound calls by using Tiscali Netphone as an answering service.

Unlike Skype, Netphone doesn’t support Apple Macs or Linux.