Free Conference Calling Blog

We just got asked: “I live In Darwin Northern Territory Australia.  Can I register for Rondee’s conference call service? I can’t locate Australia on the time zone many thanks”

You can definitely for and use Rondee’s conference calling service.  We do have other Australian users.  However, please keep a couple things in mind.  We currently do not have Australian time-zones so it is necessary to choose a US based time zone such as Eastern Standard Time.  Also, your Australian users would need to make a phone call to the US.  Our dial in number is 619-276-6333 which is a California number.  I believe that many of our Australian users either use Skype or have a very inexpensive foreign dialing plan.

A user asked: ” I was trying to attach personalized PIN that I created before I created my Rondee account. I now realize I should have waited to personalize PIN after account. Is there a way to make that one the personalized PIN for myRondee conference call account. It is currently attached to my phone number.Thanks.”

This user created a a Rondee-Now-On-Demand PIN. Once you have reserved a Rondee-On-Demand PIN, that exact same PIN cannot be used as the PIN for a Scheduled Rondee.  The system is set up that way to avoid conflicts between Rondee-On-Demand and Scheduled Rondee Conferencing Systems.

A user asked: “I am in Australia. Do you have a free conference call number in this country for participants to call in to? Can I not put my time zone as outside of the USA?
Thanks.”

At the moment, Rondee’s conference call service  only has a US access number and US timezones.  Our other users from Australia have made the same request as you and we are always exploring new possibilities but for the time-being we do not have this capability.

A user just wrote asking:

“I was wondering if I can use Rondee with any telephone service? I found out from experience that Embarq will not allow me to use FreeConferenceCalls.com. Whenever I used it, Embarq literally canceled my long distance service. Will I be able to use Rondee without having a problem? I have looked on the Embarq site and there is absolutely nothing that says I cannot use conference calls…so I figured it was just the site I was using. I really appreciate any info I can get because I really need to be able to use conference calling. Thank you!”

Rondee should work totally fine with Embarq.  Here is an easy way to test this:

http://www.rondee.com/rondeenow/

Set up a Rondee ID and call-in. It should work fine.

A user asked us today: “I know that if a long distance fee is incurred, it is what ever the long distance carrier would charge. What I want to be able to do, is to tell one of my participants that if he/she has Verizon, the fee per minute to call the Rondee number would be _____cents per minute.”

It is hard to have a quick easy reference for the legacy carriers.  The reason is that there are so many different plans per carrier.  Some carriers have flat rate plans (e.g. pay $20 or $30 per month and then pay zero per long distance call), some have plans where you pay nothing per month but then pay 5 to 10 cents per minute long distance, other plans you pay $5.95 a month and then pay less than five cents a minute long distance.  And that can be all variations within the same carrier — and on top of that, the legacy carriers frequently have offerings that differ by the state you are in.  So you can imagine the complexity of this….

However, here there are resource that can be helpful to your participants.  Just Google the phrase long distance call plans!

For cell phone carriers it is much easier.  Virtually all cell phone carriers treat long distance calls the same way they treat local calls — just deducts minutes from your plan.

On person recently wrote in and asked, “We are interested in using your free conference calling service. However, we know that participants will/may incur long distance calling charges. Is there a way to determine what these charges will be? Before we ask participants to make a commitment?”

The answer is yes.  Calls to Rondee go to 619-2-RONDEE (619-276-6333).  So calls to the Rondee bridge-line cost exactly the same as any other long distance call you would make to area code 619 which is in California. Check with your carrier and see what you would normally pay to call the 619 area code and that will be the same cost they charge you to call Rondee.  Keep in mind that Rondee itself does not charge you for use of our conference calling service.

A user wrote to us asking: “Can we have 5 different permanent pin #s/access codes (1 for each client for example) for client calls rather than having each individual receive a new pin # for each call conference scheduled?”

The answer is yes.

OPTION 1
You can set up 5 unique (and permanent) PINs, one per client using Rondee On-Demand Free Conference Calling.  These can be used 24/7 and are NOT scheduled through the Rondee website.

OPTION 2
If you would rather use the Scheduled Rondee conferencing system through the website, the way that works is that each PIN code is glued to an email.  In other words, every time you invite someone, they always access Rondee with the same PIN code which is unique to them and attached to their email.  So if you have 5 clients, they would each have their own permanent unique PIN.

One user just asked us:

“I just had a couple of questions. How many people can you have on one conference call at one time? It is really free, like no extra charges? The duration of each conference call? And do you use automated voices while the conference call is going on? Thanks! ”

Here are the details:

1. You can have up to 50 at a time on a Rondee conference call

2. Rondee does not charge for the use of our free conference calling service.  Your phone company will charge you whatever they would normally charge you to call a California number (Rondee’s conference number is 619-276-6333)

3. Conference Calls can last as long as you want

4. The only automated voice you’ll hear is the greeting welcoming you and indicating that you are entering the conference

Organizers frequently ask us whether all invitees to a Rondee conference call need to have a computer.  The answer is no.  You as the organizer can simply tell that invitee what his or her PIN code will be.  You can find the PIN code for that invitee to a scheduled Rondee on the web-page corresponding to that specific Rondee conference.  To find that page, just log into your account, click on “My Rondees” and click on that specific Rondee.  The conference details shown on that page will include the PIN for that user.

Today we had a user write-in with a variety of questions about the Rondee conference calling service:
1) Are there any limits to either call length or number of ports for your conference calls?
2) Are any ads played before, during, or after the conference call?
3) What kind of security is available to prevent unwanted callers? Is there an access code? Is there a separate moderator access code? Can the mod lock the conference? Any other security features?

4) Has Rondee been a free conference calling service since it began?

Here are the answers:

1.) Generally speaking, we can serve up to 50 ports per conference.  There is no limit to the length of the call.

2.) No ads during/before/after the call!  The only thing you would ever hear would be informational prompts about Rondee itself.

3.) Scheduled Rondee has a unique access code per user.  Rondee-Now has one access code for all callers during the conference call.  Yes, you can lock the conference.  You would press pound 2 to lock or unlock the Rondee conference call.
4)Yes