Making Cheap Calls To Gambia:
International Dialling Code: 220 - Dial out code: 00
There are now many free downloads allowing people in the USA,
UK or Europe to make cheap / free calls to Gambia.
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 This
can be done through smartphones, phone cards or pc to pc or pc
to landline international phone calls over the Internet to Banjul.
Among the free calls apps for smartphones are Viber, Vonage, Nimbuzz,
Fring, Tango, NetTalk, TalkBox, Vtok and Skype. Among the other
VoIP services are London Web, Yahoo Voice and Google Hangouts,
GTalk To Voip. The last of which allows some 'free' landline calls
as well by switching it to low cost local rates. For more information
see Voip Review (USA), voip-news.com or voipproducts.eu which
include reviews and comprehensive resources of services available
in your country.
Another budget option is to buy phone calling cards which can
be cheap compared with standard services.
Other services include:
Betamax GmbH - Sipdiscount (Germany)
Webcalldirect
Voipcheap.co.uk
Wengo
Live Messenger
Jajah
Gizmo
Making Calls From Banjul:
You have two phone options for making calls locally. The first
is by going to a telecentre & the second option is to buy
a cellular phone (commonly referred to as a "mobile").
A local telecentre in Gambia is like a payphone—you can make calls
from there, but it is trickier to receive calls. Telecentres are
everywhere, especially in residential area.
Calls are bought by the unit, rather than the minute, with local
calls costing far less units than international calls.
Approximately, local calls cost about one dalasi per minute, while
international calls cost about $0.90-$1.10 per minute. Note that
in many telecentres, rates differ depending on the hour and day—Sunday
night after 11:00 pm are usually the cheapest.
The Gambia uses UK and French phone jacks so you may need an adapter
for both types of socket.
Buying a mobile phone, called a "mobile," is a reasonable
option if you intend to stay in the country for a while and the
device (and the cost) can be shared among several people. Mobile
phones from the United States will not work in The Gambia, so
don’t bother bringing them. Mobile phones can be bought at many
Gamtel,
Gamcel
and Africell
offices. One Africell office is located on Kairaba Avenue, in
the large white building at the junction with Mosque Road (number
73 on “Bakau to Serekunda area” map) Also on Kairaba Avenue, a
Gamtel Office is located slightly past the junction with Post
Office Road, coming from Fajara (number 86).
There are three parts you must buy to make a mobile function—the
actual phone, a SIM card, and a scratch card. The cheapest phones
run at about $14.00 to $16.00. A SIM card, (a one-time purchase)
plugs in to the phone, hooking you to the network and providing
your unique phone number. Africell SIM cards run around $0.50;
Gamtel SIM cards are about $1.00.
The final component is a scratch card, which acts a substitute
for the phone plans you buy in America—it gives you a set amount
of talking time. Your scratch cards must be bought to correspond
to the type of phone; i.e. a Gamtel phone card will not work with
an Africell phone. They can be purchased at many local shops and
telecentres—look for the signs that are usually posted outside
the building. Scratch cards can be bought in varying amounts at
the price of about $0.04 per unit, ranging from about $1.50 to
$9.00. Units correspond to minutes by a certain variable, depending
on whom you phone—international calls take up far more units than
local ones. For instance, a scratch card costing about $1.50 will
give you about two minutes to talk to your family in America but
about 45 minutes to speak to your friend in Serekunda. You only
need a scratch card to make outgoing calls—the best part about
Gambian mobiles is that incoming calls (including international)
are completely free.
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A-Z of Gambia Telecoms
Cos. 
