i am wondering if canadian prisons ( my mans in Edmonton remand center right now , and will be going to edmonton max shortly ) have calling cards ? Does anyone know the aprox. cost ? or the minuites on a calling card ? Thank you .

Welcome to PTO lost in canada!
In my experience calling cards are not allowed. In the provincial jail where I was we had a phone card that we could put money on from our trust accounts or make collect calls. Where my man is in a federal prison all calls are collect.
Hope this helps.

Well, calling cards would be great if they worked. Collect is killing me, gonna have to get a second job...:argh: !!!haha, but all kidding aside, My friend is currently at Grande Cache Institution. As of right now, not allowed anything yet 'cept collect. But...yesterday, I received an email from there saying that as they are switching to a different phone company (can't 'member which one now) their policies there might change. Probably won't but it's nice to get some sort of response after all my crusading! Don't know if that applies to other Alberta institutions or not...I'll re post if i find anything out.

I've heard that there may be an option coming soon for Canadian prisoners. It would be nice. Collect calls are killer.

peace
Dana

i heard from a friend of mine who's also friend with someone who works for the CSC and apparently bell canada and CSC are putting together a calling card system for inmates. its supposed to begin sometime in October in Joyceville and they will only cost 9cents a minute. its supposed to be in full effect in all Canadian prisons by March 07.

My man tells me they are installing the phones now at Bath so he will should be able to buy a card in next cpl weeks.

Joyceville is up and running with phone cards now.

How do the phone cards work? My husband in Bath told me the same thing. Will it make a difference for local collect calls which are currently costing 75 cents and taxes.

In Federal Prison they now have calling cards in Ontario as of December 06.

The inmates put the money on their calling card account and it is MUCH cheaper than collect calls. It's cheaper to give them money to put on their card then for them to call collect.

Hope this helps.
:thumbsup:

I think it is either 9 or 11 cents a minute and it doesn't matter what time of day the call is. (i.e. it doesn't have to be after 6pm)

Millhaven just got new phones installed and they will be able to purchase the calling cards soon off their canteen.

Millhaven just got new phones installed and they will be able to purchase the calling cards soon off their canteen.


Thanks for the info my man will be going to millhaven in the next month or so i will for sure let him know about the calling cards

Millhaven just got new phones installed and they will be able to purchase the calling cards soon off their canteen.THANK YU FOR POSTING THIS INFORMATION I FOUND IT VERY USEFULL MY PHONE BILLS WITH BELL ARE OVER A THOUSAND A MONTH.

Millhaven just got new phones installed and they will be able to purchase the calling cards soon off their canteen.THAK YOU FOR THE INFO GREATLY APPRECIATED PHONE BILL IS A THOUSAND A MONTH FROM BELL.

Last November(06) the pay phone systems in Joyceville and Pittsburg were changed over to accept calling cards. HOWEVER...as of a couple of months ago they were not yet operational due to "glitches" in the system.
I have not yet heard that they are working.
~Casey~

I know that they are not allowed to use outside calling cards, but when accepting the collect call, are you able to press 0 to speak to the operator, then put the call onto your own calling card, thus using your own long distance plan versus theirs?

Does anyone know if inmates can call cell phones instead of landlines?? My roommates aren't the biggest fans of having extremely expensive collect calls from prison on the bill, even though I cover the cost. :P

:idea: What about Penetanguishene, does anyone know if the calliing cards are in the works or do we have to live with collect calls ???:eek:

No, they cant call cell phones imatiger. as for penetnag, im sure you'll have to deal w/the collect calls because they only have the calling cards at Joyceville at the moment. They were supposed to be in all federal facilities by late 07, but as we all know CSC is sloooow!

Millhaven Assessment Unit (MAU) is live on phone cards now. I spoke to the Finance and Administration Group to get the skinny on this. here's how it plays out....

The inmate can apply as much as he wants to the phone card.
When the money comes in, it is processed, sent to the bank for currency verification etc. and then applied to his account.
Once that happens the inmate can fill out the appropriate form to add the money (as much as he likes) as long as he keeps $80 in savings.
Phone card transfers DO NOT impact the annual withdrawal limit. He can transfer as often as he likes and as much as he likes to the phone card.
One catch, is that they ONLY LOAD THE CARDS ONCE PER MONTH. It is usually around the 20th of the month and the cut off for transfers is around mid month.
The finance group prepares a list around the 15th, sends it to Bell Canada and they load the cards "around" the 20th. In January, the load took place in the 24th.
Good news is, that long distance is a flat $0.0975 (nine and three quarter cents) per minute which is WAY cheaper than collect for sure!
Hope this helps a little.
bub...

Hy you can contact this company for your calls in canada also.

its realy cheap. getconnected us . net

now heres a question i have my bf is in jail about two hours away and with my long distance plan that i have i get 40,000 min a month day or night and i have a call me calling card number that comes with this package so that i can give this number to other people so that they can call me from other locations across canada or the u.s.a and it just gets taken off my 40,000 mins a month so this being a calling card number do u think my bf would is on remand right now at penatanguishne in ontario do u think he owuld be able to use this calling card number to call me? or would i have to do the collect calls?