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Communications
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Communications in Russia have improved greatly in recent years. Most
post offices
are open Mon-Sat 8am-7pm. All district post offices have
poste restante
(
do vostrA©bovaniya
) services. Both Moscow and St Petersburg have excellent express-letter post companies, such as Post International and Westpost, which despatch mail via Finland or the US for moderate sums.
Street phones are good for local and international calls. To use them you need a
phonecard
(available in 25, 50, 100, 200, 400 and 1000 units from newspaper kiosks and post offices). Moscow's public phones are less numerous and less efficient than those in St Petersburg. Phone booths in airports and major hotels aren't always run by the city phone network, and are much more expensive. You can buy cards for these phones on the spot or use your Amex or Visa card. By far the cheapest option in St Petersburg (with off-peak discounts) is the Telephone Service Card, usable from any tone-dial phone (available in 300, 600, 1200, 3000 and 6000 units).
Mobile phones
abound in both cities, and GSM users will have no trouble plugging in to the local system.
Email
and Internet access is offered cheaply in a number of Internet cafA©s. Other useful information
for tourists (each section contains more specific sub-sections): |
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Russian Federation |