From these market-forces, buytheminute.com created a solution to bring the unbelievable international long distance deals closer to the residential and small business user without the traditional overhead costs.

So why don't traditional long distance carriers provide these better long distance rates to me now?

Large telecommunication carriers buy and sell minutes between each other to international destinations. These rates change daily, even hourly, depending on the number of minutes each carrier can process to a certain country. The "swapping" of minutes as it is referred to within the industry is so transparent that the end user has no idea that their specific call has been transferred from one carrier to another. You may think you are an AT&T, Bell, Sprint, or MCI Worldcom customer but in fact your call could be routed over any of 50 different carriers that are connected to your long distance company. But the carrier you have today rarely passes along their true cost to you for two reasons:

1. These costs change daily. Therefore, the typical carrier publishes their rates based on the HIGHEST cost route that they have to each destination in order to ensure that they never lose money. If they get a better "swap" price on a certain day, they keep the difference, not you!
2. Carriers incur significant marketing, sales, distribution and administrative costs, which must be passed along to the end consumer along with the carriers wholesale cost for each minute.

Buytheminute.com - Telecom Arbitrager
We decided that the best way to get access to the best international long distance rates was to connect to a number of different carriers. Some countries are less expensive to call from Canada, and some are less expensive from the United States. Sometimes, buying in different currencies helps us get an even better rate. Each carrier chosen was connected to international gateways allowing buytheminute.com access to the "swapping rates" as they occurred. Buytheminute.com has set the stage to get access to the best rates from the best routes around the world and become a Telecom Arbitrager.

Buytheminute.com then markets, sells, collects money, fulfill orders, and provides customer service over the internet, so we can get those deeply discounted "swapping" rates directly to you, the consumer. As a result, utilizing telecom industry expertise, economic efficiencies, and the power of the internet, buytheminute.com was born!