AT&T Call International app offers low rates at home and abroad

AT&T has introduced an AT&T Call International Application. What it lacks in name originality, it makes up for in cheap long-distance rates from all Apple iPhone models and a number of Android and BlackBerry smartphones.

Plus, when abroad, the app can be used — by the iPhone and Android devices, anyway — over a Wi-Fi connection for the same low rates.

In the U.S., users simply launch the app, dial the international number and hit call, for rates such as 4 cents a minute to wireless or wireline phones in China.

When abroad, they connect to a Wi-Fi network, dial the number and can be calling the United Kingdom for 27 cents per minute to a mobile phone or 4 cents to a wireless. The app just barely edges out Skype's 9.2 cents to India with a flat 9 cents, whether to a mobile or landline, and wallops its 33.6-cent rate to a mobile in Mexico with an AT&T rate of 23 cents a minute. Fring, beating them both, charges just 12.2 cents to a mobile in Mexico.

Users can manage their account online, and should note that when abroad, any calls not made over Wi-Fi will incur normal international roaming rates, as will any incoming calls.

Voice over LTE (VoLTE) is the future of the VoIP market, analysts agree. Until full LTE networks are rolled out, and VoLTE handsets ubiquitous, over-the-top (OTT) mobile VoIP services will continue to grow (CP: MetroPCS to begin VoIP transition in early 2010). Though not without their challenges, Infonetics Research analyst Diane Myers said in an October mobile VOIP report forecasting mobile VoIP subscribers to near 410 million by 2015.

"With free applications and extremely low revenue from users, it is tricky for application providers without the deep pockets of larger companies like Google, Microsoft and Telefónica to have a sustainable long-term business model," wrote Myers. "Despite the fact that we expect mobile VoIP subscribers to grow nearly 10-fold from 2010 to 2015, there is relatively little money to be made from it in the near term."

Ken Hyers, an analyst with Technology Business Research, suggests the app won't really hurt AT&T's international calling revenue, as it's not flexible enough for business people, so is more likely to appeal to vacationing consumers.

"For casual travelers, who want to be able to make a call from a hotel or Internet café, this is a really nice benefit since it lets them stay in touch with home without having to ring up high-per-minute international roaming charges," said Hyers.

Also nice, he added, "is that it integrates the kind of service that many people are already using into an AT&T phone, which simplifies the process for customers who are not familiar with using VoIP services."