Telephone costs
End of call-by-call: cheap area codes are no longer needed
Updated on January 1, 2025 – 1:49 p.mReading time: 3 min.
Cheap area codes should keep telephone costs down for many years. But the business model is no longer worthwhile.
The cheap area codes for telephone calls, called call-by-call, are history. A corresponding market model will expire at the turn of the year, Deutsche Telekom and the Association of Telekom Competitors VATM said upon request. It was about calls from a landline phone, it wasn’t about calls from a cell phone.
Demand for savings area codes has recently been low: According to the Federal Network Agency, 1.6 percent of telephone minutes in Germany in 2023 were call-by-call, compared to 4.2 percent in 2013. In the noughties the proportion was even higher. The reason for the change: Flat rate tariffs and calls via Internet services have long made calls possible at no extra charge, so cheap area codes are no longer necessary in most cases.
Things were different at the turn of the millennium – back then, call-by-call was a mass business because it was a cheap alternative to the relatively expensive telephone tariffs of Deutsche Telekom, whose monopoly ended in 1998 and then call-by-call became possible. Telekom had to open its network to private providers; companies such as 01051 Telecom, 01050 com, Talkline and Tele2 took advantage of this and offered low per-minute prices for long-distance and international calls. According to VATM, they were up to 90 percent cheaper than normal telephone calls via Telekom.
Around the turn of the millennium and in the noughties, cheap area codes became the standard in many households: parents warned their children to make phone calls “with the area code” – i.e. call-by-call – in order to keep the telephone bill within limits. In some households, pieces of paper cut out of newspapers with the best area codes and prices per minute were hung right next to the landline telephone as a reminder. Over the years, the pieces of paper yellowed and were eventually torn off: they were no longer important.
On the one hand, this was due to the fact that domestic tariffs increasingly had telephone flat rates, without per-minute prices. And anyone who frequently called abroad could secure a flat rate option to a country or a group of countries for a corresponding surcharge – the per-minute price was then also eliminated for them, so they no longer needed a cheap area code. In addition, services such as Facetime, Whatsapp, Signal and Threema enabled free conversations over the Internet.
The regulation of the call-by-call niche market by the Federal Network Agency ended in 2020, after which the VATM and Telekom concluded an agreement to continue the market model – this is now expiring.
“The call-by-call area codes have long been important for citizens with low budgets or without an internet connection in order to be able to maintain contact with family and friends,” says VATM managing director Frederic Ufer. “The inexpensive call-by-call tariffs are a very important alternative, especially for older people who cannot or do not want to use digital services, and for people with a migrant background who want to call their home country.”
According to the VATM, there is now “a gap, especially for cheap international calls”. But there are messenger and video telephony as well as international flat rates. “Consumers should proactively approach their providers and inquire directly about international flat rates and tariffs that enable cheap international calls. Many providers have special offers that are tailored to international calls.”
There are other savings area codes
Even after call-by-call ends, there will still be savings area codes. These are so-called callthrough numbers, which, however, work a little differently. On the one hand, you can dial them on both the landline and on the cell phone, but on the other hand, they have a catch: According to the comparison portal Verivox, every call is billed, even if the call does not take place, for example because the person called does not answer or calls is occupied by him. Verivox also points out that tariff announcements for callthrough services are voluntary.