If calling Haiti from the United States is a common thing for you then you are no doubt aware of the high costs involved.  Most calls terminating in Haiti are subject to the country’s extremely high termination fees and taxes which make each call significantly more expensive than in countries with free market economies.

Standard telecommunication companies charge a per-minute rate for calls to Haiti. Other options exist too, where you pay a monthly fee in order to receive a reduced rate per minute, but the reality in the modern day is that technological advances are steering us away from these traditional telephone practices and towards more efficient online services instead.

So we’ll look at a few of the options below in order to see which way is most optimal, bearing in mind the smartphone and tablet app boom.

Traditional Operators

- Verizon offer normal pay as you go call services as well as numerous packages.  Individual calls to Haiti from the US can stretch upwards to $1.49 per minute to call landlines and $1.69 per minute to call mobile/cell phones on normal tariffs, so it’s worth contacting your customer service adviser for the best latest package option. For example, at the time of writing, prices drop to 34 cents and 44 cents respectively if you pay a $3.99 monthly fee for international long distance calling.

- Sprint has similar rates and packages to Verizon and with competition ever growing in the telecommunications market, prices are in a state of regular flux.  Likewise here, rates are lower if you sign up to a monthly subscription, specified for calls to Haiti.

- AT&T has slightly cheaper rates per-minute and a variety of international monthly plans that see rates fall by over 50% depending on the subscription fee and time of commitment.

If a traditional carrier is your preferred option then you would be strongly advised to give them a call to negotiate the best rate for you, being sure that you have access to something in writing/online, confirming the rates that you will be paying so you avoid any possible hidden charges.

Smartphone/Tablet Apps

Making calls to Haiti from the US no longer needs to be seen as an expensive action, with numerous apps available across multi-platforms including iPhone, Android and Windows phones as well as tablets. Such apps can save users a lot of money over traditional carrier charges for international dialing, and can usually be used with Wi-Fi, therefore also reducing drain on data plans. 

- Skype is one of the more popular options, with free calling between users who both have Skype installed, and reasonable rates for international VoIP calls. Video chat is also available. The main downside is that audio quality on Skype can be unpredictable. For calls to Haitian phone numbers you can choose a pay-per-use model or prepay for a block of 400 minutes in order to get a slightly cheaper rate per-minute.  Prices tend to be cheaper than those of traditional carriers.

- Rebtel is a calling app that has the added advantage of being usable via smartphone, cellphone AND landline. Rates to make a call to Haiti from the US are among the lowest in the market while call quality remains high.

If you are looking for the cheapest way to call Haiti from the USA, a VoIP provider is probably your best bet. You can avoid the monthly fees and high per minute rates and spend more time talking with the people you love without major budget concerns.