Seemingly in an effort to prove its worth as a major player in the telephony sector, Skype is now allowing users to set up premium-rate services through the program. If you fancy setting up your own technical support line, or even a ‘adult chat’ line, you can now do so thanks to the Skype Prime feature within the latest beta release.
The new service allows customers to charge incoming callers by the minute or require a one-time fee, providing pay-for services at the click of a button. Once activated, the new feature, which only works with with Skype-to-Skype calls, prompts callers to make a payment to connect to a Skype Prime partner via a number of payment methods.
Skype’s decision to include this service comes in the wake of a growth spurt in the number of question-and-answer-style services that allow users to get instant responses to a particular query. Following the success of online services such as Google Answers and Yahoo! Answers, Skype aims to snare customers who want to provide fast answers to their users’ questions. This sounds great for businesses that can’t afford to set up their own premium access telephony systems, though it’s worth baring in mind that Skype will charge you a 30 percent fee of the revenues you reap.
