By Sandra Quinn

Being away from home is a hard thing for anyone, but for those who have family thousands of miles away it is even harder and without the advancements in online communication, many of these people would not want to pursue a life so far away from all that is familiar.

Ciaran Carolan, originally from Mitchelstown, Co Cork, is one of those people and without the Globex Call app, contacting people back home would be much more expensive, less reliable and he would have a connection which is much worse.

Like many people in their late twenties and early thirties, Ciaran left Cork because he had a qualification, but there was no work in his trade and he was living week to week in a menial job for very little wages.

He left for Australia in March 2013 and now lives in Arizona, Julia Creek, working as a cowboy on a huge cattle farm.

His job entails travelling around a vast and tricky terrain tending to the needs of 48,000 cattle and the areas where he lives and works are very remote with poor internet quality.

“I call home every night, but Globex Call is especially handy where I live, as I don’t have network coverage. It’s like making a regular phone call through WiFi to a normal phone,” Ciaran said.

He added that since he installed the app almost two months ago, it has made a big difference to his life.

Globex Call allows users to top up with credit and using their WiFi, call a mobile or landline anywhere in the world and the call recipient does not have to be online. If the other person also has the app and is online, you can call them for free using the app.

“Globex Call is definitely an advantage to me. I normally used FaceTime, Viber or other apps, but these were only useful if the other person had the app and was online. Globex is ideal because I can call anybody. All they have to have is a phone and I can call them. This is particularly handy for elderly friends and relatives at home who don’t have smart phones or go online. And it’s cheap – really cheap.

“I would recommend it to anyone anywhere in the world to make calls for less and their customer service is spot on, as we had a few teething problems initially due to the remote area I’m in and the WiFi connections.”

Ciaran added that he cannot stress how important a role the internet has in his daily life and with keeping up that connection to home.

“Without WiFi, I wouldn’t be able to contact home unless I drove to the nearest town 200km away.

“A good app is everything to me. All of my communication at work is done through apps on my satellite WiFi,” he said.