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

Yes, InmateAid's phone service works for inmates at North Platte Regional Correctional Center in Nebraska. If you are talking regularly with someone there, it is worth setting up because the savings add up quickly. The per-call rates at county facilities can be steep, and InmateAid's number brings that cost down to a more reasonable level. On video calls, that is not part of the service at this time. InmateAid's phone line is voice only. Video visitation at county jails is typically...

CDCR has launched limited video visiting to allow friends and family to safely connect with incarcerated people, beginning at five institutions by Nov. 28 with more added through the end of the year. In-person visiting remains canceled statewide until further notice as part of the department’s COVID-19 response. Under the new system, each inmate will have the opportunity for a free 30-minute video visit every 30 days. Visits will take place on weekends and holidays, between 8:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. The...

Sending shoes from the outside directly to an inmate is rarely permitted. Most facilities, particularly federal prisons, do not allow personal footwear to be mailed or brought in by family. The security and contraband concerns around outside packages are tight, and shoes are rarely on the approved items list. The good news is that size 17 is carriable through the federal commissary system. The Bureau of Prisons commissary stocks larger sizes specifically because the inmate population includes people who cannot be...

A 214 number is a Dallas area code, and Wilmer sits just south of Dallas in Dallas County, so it feels like the logical choice. Local should mean cheaper. In the prison phone world, that assumption will cost you money. With Securus, which holds contracts across Texas facilities, including Dallas County, all in-state numbers are actually more expensive than out-of-state numbers. That is not a typo. It runs counter to everything you would expect, but it is how Securus structures its...

The confusion is understandable because there are a lot of services competing for your attention, and not all of them are straightforward about what they actually do. Here is how to think about it. GTL, now rebranded as Viapath, is the phone carrier contracted to your husband's facility. If GTL holds that contract, every call he makes goes through their system regardless of what number he dials. You cannot replace GTL. What you can do is change the number he dials...

Yes, and this is one of the less talked-about benefits of the service. When an inmate makes calls through the facility's phone carrier, every number they dial has to be submitted and approved in advance. That approval process requires the person on the outside to register their phone number with the carrier, which means your name, number, and in some cases your address go into that system. For people on a family plan, a work phone, or any situation where the...

The honest answer is that the provider matters less than the number, and the number matters because of how the BOP prices calls. Local calls in the federal system run $0.06 per minute. Long-distance calls run $0.21 per minute. That $0.15 per minute difference is where the money goes, and if your inmate is on the phone regularly, it goes fast. Three hundred minutes at long-distance rates costs $63. Three hundred minutes at the local rate costs $18. Same conversations, same...