Various reports today suggest Tesco is 'reacting to customer demand' and offering VoIP alongside it's traditional fixed line and mobile telecoms products. I've searched through the Tesco site, but haven't found anything either in terms of product or even a news release.

As a very happy Skype customer it'll be interesting to see how Tesco manage to compete and what protocols they are using (hopefully sticking to standards, although I know Skype doesn't!)

Rumour has it that Tesco will be charging more for calls to UK landlines than Skype (2p/min v. 1.2p/min for Skype), but a good deal less for calls to mobiles. Hopefully this will drive Skype to reduce it's rates on mobiles as well. A little competition never did anyone any harm, although I do worry about Tesco dominating yet another market.

All you have to do is pop down to your local Tescos and pick up a 'pack' that includes some credit and a USB phone.

My experience of using 'standard' VoIP products revealed real problems with getting calls through pretty standard retail ADSL routers so it will be interesting to see how Tesco cope with this and how good they are at dealing with the issues. I doubt they are doing this themselves, so it'll be interesting to see who they have partnered with - does anyone know?