To answer your Skype questions:

Skype Out is $60/year. It gives you a US number, which anyone can call from the US for free. It does include free voicemail. It also has the ability to forward to your cell phone, which you can easily turn on and off in the preferences. If you forward to your cell phone, however, it will charge you $0.17/min, which is the skype-out rate for SXM.

When you call to the U.S. with skype, it costs $0.02/minute. But, I usually just called people and had them call me back. $10 of skype credit goes a long way at $0.02/min! Also, if you call an 800-number in the US, for whatever reason, it's free.

Skype works well in St. Maarten - much better with Caribserve though than NETstar. In the dorms, it works very well when the internet is working. However, since the dorm internet is so flaky, the skype connection can be too. Skype uses up far less bandwidth than Vonage though, so it's almost always a better connection than that. Skype is also cheaper than Vonage. I do not use a skype handset (I always use my computer), but if you do have one, then it's the same as using any other phone. Skype also has the advantage of being able to video conference with anyone else using skype. It also has IM built in, which a lot of people use here.

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