December 2010
NTech IT Trading, wholesale and mail order electronics supplier, our consultants specialise in satellite, telecom, broadcasting and IT services.

Least Cost Routing (LCR)

In order to provide low cost calls, Long Distance Telephony Providers must by-pass the regular telephone company to achieve competitive rates. Often service providers establish private VPNs, using emerging technologies such as "Voice Over IP", or proven technologies such as Voice Over Frame. These carriers often rely on a large number of alternative carriers to complete the network. The local public telephone companies then enter into some form of volume or other tariff arrangement and the LCR service provider usually provides one or many access-numbers to get the most effective call price around.

These alternative carriers offer varying discounts dependent on time of day and destination. To maximize all potential savings, service providers make use of LCR (least cost routing) Diallers, which can be programmed and re-programmed to re-route calls to destinations, by re-dialling them through the lowest cost alternative carrier of the moment. These are referred to as "diallers" and are small inline units between your phone and the line. In most cases these diallers are line powered, some models have optional power supply units these are needed when the PTT line characteristics are such that not enough current can be drawn to activate the dialler unit, this is normally only the case on some cable lines and for analogue lines which are developed from digital adaptor units. (such as ISDN TA, or ATA).

Using our dialer products as basis for example a typical customised least cost routing table is shown below... This is an actual example from one of our customer's diallers, as you can see the application of a correctly programmed dialler can save money. Although the tariff pricing may now be out of date it reflects the flexibility of the diallers.

What you can see is that for this example different codes are shown for different destinations this achieves the best possible combination of prices for this particular customer's usage.. This genuine example is typical from one of our premium diallers.
(NB spelling : diallers or dialers both words have the same meaning)

Customised Tariff Table Germany - landlines - Mon - Fri 09:00 - 18:00 1,9 ct/min (01071)
Germany - landlines - Mon - Fri 18:00 - 09:00 1,7 ct/min (01071)
Germany - landlines - Weekends/Public Holidays 09:00 - 18:00 2,5 ct/min (01071)
Germany - landlines - Weekends/Public Holidays 18:00 - 09:00 1,1 ct/min (01071)
Germany - Mobiles - 24 * 7 * 365 --:-- - --:-- 14,79 ct/min (01059)
Germany - local SAT/SUN 0,99ct/min 7pm-7am 0,99 ct/min (01013)
Germany; local Mon - Fri 7am-7pm 3,09 ct/min (01013)
UK - Mobiles - 24 * 7 * 365 --:-- - --:-- 16,40 ct/min (01077)
UK - Landlines - 24 * 7 * 365 --:-- - --:-- 1,30 ct/min (01077)
Gibraltar landline - 24 * 7 * 365 --:-- - --:-- 3,50 ct/min (01050)
Gibraltar mobile - 24 * 7 * 365 --:-- - --:-- 15,9 ct/min (01050)
International - 24 * 7 * 365 --:-- - --:-- >4,50 ct/min (01013)
Catch All --> 01090 0800 Free phone - defaults to DT
BARRED --> 0900 / 0190
Exceptions --> numbers beginning 1
Override Dialer --> 1891
Withhold Number --> *31#

Another example using our budget dialer is shown below.. (this is a sample - the prefixes, numbers and prices are false)..

UK Local 1815 - free 0p p/min 
UK National 11866 - 1p per call / entire duration
International 08457234561 - 2p per minute
Speed-dial 1 : 2788 : 181500492115282000 Aunty Bessie - 1.5p per minute
Speed-dial 2 : 2789 : 1815015428876543 Uncle Donald - 0.5p per hour

One of the advantages of using a user programmable LCR dialler is that you control the services used, if you find a better deal then simply reprogram the unit to suit your needs. We also list access codes on this site which are suitable from the UK. We can provide LCR diallers for business in bulk, we can provide dialogue call routing equipment, we even can integrate ISDN into LCR or provide LCR Gateways to give your business a transparant transition into voIP. So if you are using ISDN just now for your calls, consider us for providing you voIP.