Ask The Inmate. Real answers from people who've been there.

Yes. Correctional facilities are required under the Americans with Disabilities Act to provide deaf and hard of hearing inmates with reasonable accommodations for communication, and that includes telephone access. The most common solution at facilities that serve deaf inmates is a TTY machine, also called a TDD, which allows typed text communication over a phone line. Facilities are required to have TTY equipment available for inmates who need it, and family members on the outside need a compatible TTY device or...

Your inmate can call home by calling collect but AT&T does not have the contract with the jail, you will be paying GTL for this collect call. Please be mindful that this is the most expensive way of receiving and inmate call, it will cost at least $14.99 per 15 minutes.  GTL has a prepaid option through their website. The cost of the calls vary depending upon where the call connects. If you are inter-state long distance, the cost of...

The letter and photo service from InmateAid is straightforward. You type up a letter and upload photos where applicable - proceed to the Pay Now page and complete the transaction. The letter order flows through our Admin area to the Processing Department. Letters are processed immediately upon entry unless it is after 6pm on Saturday, then the letters do not go through the process until Monday morning. You may check in your My Account area to see the status of...

The phone service at a particular correctional center is set up through bid process. In this case, Global Tel*Link has the contract for all inmate outbound calling and to tape record the calls - essentially a monopoly. Therefore, you have to use them to receive any calls. The choice is whether you pay GTL for a long distance call (to your number) or a local call (to a number that we get you). If you are already local, we cannot save you money. We get you...

When someone gets transferred to a new facility without warning, it can feel like they have disappeared. The good news is that there are several reliable ways to locate an inmate and track their current location. VINELink is one of the best free resources available. It is a national victim notification network that also allows family members to search for inmates by name and receive alerts when their status or location changes. It covers most state and county facilities across the...

Mail is considered sacred in a prison, detention center or jail. You cannot send stamps and other sundries through the mail, you can only send her money to her inmate trust account. When the inmate has money on their books, they buy the writing material and stamps at the commissary. There is also a program for indigent inmates at every facility where they supply paper, pencil, envelopes and stamps. Whether the inmate has money on their books or not, there...

There is no single cheapest solution that applies to every jail or prison because the phone service at each facility is controlled by a contracted provider that sets its own pricing. Companies like Securus, GTL, and ICSolutions operate under exclusive contracts with individual facilities, which means the rate you pay is largely dictated by whichever company holds the contract at that specific location. Shopping around between providers is not an option the way it would be for a regular phone...

The letter and photo service from InmateAid is straightforward. You type up a letter and upload photos where applicable - proceed to the Pay Now page and complete the transaction. The letter order flows through our Admin area to the Processing Department. Letters are processed immediately upon entry unless it is after 6pm on Saturday, then the letters do not go through the process until Monday morning. You may check in your My Account area to see the status of...

InmateAid works in every prison, jail or detention center in the United States. There are varying degrees of how much we can help and which service works best for your situation.  Our mail service makes it into all facilities unless there is a "post card only" restriction. We will have a post card option within a few weeks and at that point we will have 100% coverage. Magazine subscriptions are allowed in all facilities, paperback books, too.  The telephone service works in almost...