You cannot ring into a prison in England and Wales. The phone system takes no incoming calls. They have to ring you, and only once you are on their approved list of friends and family, which security checks when they first arrive. Meanwhile you can write, use Email a Prisoner, book a visit or ask about a secure video call.
That is the rule across England and Wales, not one prison's policy. Here is each route, with its cost and its wait.
What are the ways to contact someone in prison?
There are five, and they behave very differently. Letters: normally no limit on how many you send, though most letters in and out are checked by prison staff. Email a Prisoner: 40p a message, printed out and delivered by staff. Secure video calls: in some prisons, lasting up to 30 minutes, with one free video call a month. Visits: a convicted prisoner is usually allowed at least two 1-hour visits every 4 weeks, and someone on remand three 1-hour visits a week. Phone calls: they ring you, never the other way round, and they pay for every minute from their own credit, at 2.48p a minute to a landline or 5.5p a minute to a mobile on weekdays, under the tariff in force since 1 April 2025. Those figures are England and Wales only; Scotland and Northern Ireland run separate services under different contracts.
What separates them is who may start them, and how long each takes to work.
| route | who starts it | what it costs | typical wait |
|---|---|---|---|
| Letter | You | Postage only | None to send |
| Email a Prisoner | You | 40p a message | Printed and handed over |
| Secure video call | Either; staff schedule | 1 free a month | Up to 24 hours to verify |
| Visit | You, once added to the list | Free; help on some benefits | Up to 2 weeks |
| Phone call | Them, always | 2.48p a minute to a landline, 5.5p to a mobile | A few days |
Why can't you ring the prison and ask to speak to them?
Because the system was built to make calls out and nothing else. PSI 49/2011 says it in one line: "The PINphone system does not accept incoming calls." (PSI 49/2011, re-issued 27 August 2026)
Anything coming the other way goes through an official prison telephone, arranged by staff. Pre-arranged office-phone calls continue for the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman's office, the Criminal Cases Review Commission and Cafcass: narrow exceptions for specific bodies, not a route for families.
It also means there is no number to ring back when a call cuts off. How the prison phone system works covers the PIN account and the contact list.
How long before they can call you?
GOV.UK is blunt about the wait: the person in prison "can only call people named on their list of friends and family. This list is checked by security when they first arrive so it may take a few days before they're able to call." (GOV.UK, Staying in touch with someone in prison)
You cannot add yourself to that list. They submit the numbers, and a prisoner on a call-enabling regime can hold up to 20 social numbers.
One call does not wait for that. On first reception the governor "must make local arrangements to allow a call to be made within the first 24 hours of reception", funded from a pre-funded PIN account paid for from public funds or by PIN credits issued as an advance (PSI 49/2011). It is short, and it usually comes before there is any credit at all.
The first week is the hardest part of this for most families. The Prisoners' Families Helpline, run by Pact, is free and national: prisonersfamilies.org. If you do not know where they have been taken, how to find out which prison someone is in sets out the official route.
What do their calls cost, and who pays for them?
They do, from their own credit, by the minute. In England and Wales the rates have been 2.48p a minute to a landline and 5.5p to a mobile on weekdays, and 2.2p and 3.6p at weekends, since 1 April 2025. They followed a 20% reduction negotiated between the Ministry of Justice and BT, the supplier, and were published only after a Freedom of Information request (Inside Time, 14 July 2025).
Prison staff can listen to and record most types of call, and what recording and monitoring actually mean is a separate question from whether anyone listens. The hours are not theirs either: access must not normally be less than two hours a day, but schedules are set centrally in each prison, which is why phone times differ between prisons.
The rate turns on the number they dial, not on where the prison is. If a landline rate would stretch the same credit further, this is the mechanism.
How do letters, email and video calls work?
Letters have the fewest conditions. Put the prisoner number on the envelope; normally there is no limit on how many you send. Most letters to and from prison are checked by staff. Letters from solicitors and courts cannot be opened except in special cases, for example if staff suspect a letter is not really from a legal adviser.
Email a Prisoner costs 40p a message. You cannot email someone in prison directly: the service prints your message and staff deliver it. In some prisons they can reply and attach a photo (GOV.UK, email and social media). GOV.UK also names Prison Voicemail. Neither service is ours.
Secure video calls run from your own mobile or tablet, in the prisons that offer them. They last up to 30 minutes, and a prisoner is allowed one free video call a month. You must be over 18 and on their list of friends and family, and may invite up to three other people of any age if they are on the visitor list. You install an app, and staff schedule the call once your account is verified. All video calls are recorded, and staff may watch them as they happen (GOV.UK, visit a prisoner using a video call).
How soon can you visit?
A convicted prisoner is usually allowed at least two 1-hour visits every 4 weeks. Someone on remand is allowed three 1-hour visits a week (GOV.UK, visiting someone in prison).
The wait comes from the visitor list, not the booking: "The prisoner must add any visitors to their visitor list before you can book a visit. This can take up to 2 weeks." You will need dates of birth for all visitors, the prisoner's date of birth, the prison number and the prison location (GOV.UK, visit someone in prison).
Four kinds of visit cannot be booked online; you ring the prison instead: legal visits, reception visits (the first visit, within 72 hours of admission), double visits of two hours instead of one, and family day visits. The reception visit is the one most families never hear about. Help with the cost of prison visits is available on certain benefits or with a health certificate (GOV.UK, help with prison visits).
How far does their credit actually go?
Not far, and the rest turns on it. Minimum prison pay is £2.50 a week if someone is unemployed, £4.00 a week if employed and £3.25 for the long-term sick or those over pension age (PSO 4460, re-issued 27 January 2020). Governors set the actual rates locally.
At those tariffs, £4.00 buys roughly 73 minutes to a mobile in a week, or roughly 161 minutes to a landline. £10 of credit is about 181 minutes to a mobile and about 403 to a landline, a little over twice as long on the same money. Both are our calculations from the published rates.
That gap in minutes is what this service exists to close, and here is exactly how. You subscribe to a real UK geographic landline number, 01 or 02, regulated by Ofcom, which forwards to a UK mainland mobile. The person in prison submits it as a social contact through the prison's normal process. The prison decides whether it goes on the list, and it can refuse: published HMPPS policy directs that "numbers linked to call diversion and re-routing services, must be restricted" (Interception, Monitoring and Security of Prisoner Communications Policy Framework, issued 11 August 2026). Calls are still logged, recorded and monitored as usual. The only thing that changes is the rate their credit is charged at.
That arithmetic is worth doing against your own use before paying anyone for anything.
Where can you get help?
The Prisoners' Families Helpline, run by Pact, is the first place to ring for anything practical. The Prison Reform Trust publishes a clear reference on contact rules and rights, and POPS supports families in the North West. Where children are involved, NICCO and Barnardo's both work with children who have a parent in prison.
Frequently asked questions
The questions families ask most often in the first fortnight.
Can I ring the prison and ask to be put through?
No. The PIN phone system accepts no incoming calls. Where there are urgent legal or compassionate circumstances, PSI 49/2011 gives operational managers discretion to allow a call at public expense, but only once satisfied the need could not be met by a visit or a letter and that the prisoner has insufficient credit.
Can I put money on their phone credit?
Not through the phone system, and not through us. Calls come out of the credit on their own PIN account. How money reaches someone in prison varies between establishments, so the Prisoners' Families Helpline is the quickest way to find out what your prison accepts.
Are the rates the same in Scotland and Northern Ireland?
No. Both run separate prison services under different contracts. Every figure on this page is England and Wales only, and we have no verified rates for either, so we publish none.
Will a prison accept a diverted landline number?
That is the prison's decision. The person in custody submits it through the normal process, the prison checks it, and it can refuse: published policy directs prisons to restrict numbers linked to call diversion services. Nothing about the number changes what is recorded or who may listen.
If you want to weigh it up, the plans are bundles of forwarding minutes.
The call has to come from them, so everything useful sits on your side of it: get the number submitted, get on the list, and write in the meantime.