Recent polls from American and European markets may mean good things for VoIP service providers.

According to ihotdesk, a recent survey of people in the US, France, the UK, and Spain found that the majority of smartphone users are increasing their reliance on VoIP services for free or cheap phone calls.

Lots of VoIP service providers make VoIP apps or VoIP softphones that you can download for your smartphone. Some VoIP service providers even allow you to download these apps for free, or for no extra charge when you buy a residential or business phone service.

And with the rise in popularity for VoIP smartphone apps, mobile service carriers are beginning to see changes in how customers are using their service. Increasingly, customers are using their wireless service providers exclusively for their occasional calling, especially if it is a call to someone who doesn’t use the same VoiP service. For example, someone might use their regular service provider to call their cable TV company because the cable TV company doesn’t use a VoIP service.

When customers can use free calling, they do. So, in a perfect scenario, if a customer can convince his family and friends to get an app with the same VoIP provider, then they can enjoy free calling whenever their smartphone has Internet access. And with the increasing widespread availability of WiFi and 4G, there are only a few situations in which people won’t be able to use VoIP.

Telappliant released an article this week that draws attention to a recent UK poll that found that the majority of employees in the UK are urging their employers to give them more lenient schedules. That is, more employees want to be able to work from home or work remotely.

In turn, the article reports, many employers believe that it is a good idea to give employees lenient schedules when they are unable to grant pay raises and bonuses.

With minimal hiring and high unemployment rampant, increasing leniency may be a good direction for a lot of employers. And if employers are allowing more employees to work remotely, there will be an increased demand for business VoIP services as employers will need to make more frequent phone calls and video conference calls.

However, lots of employees that work remotely actually choose to work in other locations like cafes and libraries where they don’t have access to their home phones. However, as long as these employees have smartphones and access to an Internet connection, they will be able to use VoIP apps for free calling with their employers.

And employees who work from home may be more inclined to get residential VoIP services as their home phone bills may suddenly go up with the increased need for calling.

This scenario will be beneficial for the work force in a number of ways. It will give employees increased job satisfaction by removing the stresses of the office environment which may in turn improve productivity.

In addition, employees can save money on their phone bills if they don’t need to use up their wireless minutes every time they call their employers.

And finally, it will allow employees to save money on gas or public transportation costs. This will also improve employee satisfaction as many employees report a lot of stress as a result of their commutes.

By Rachel Greenberg, Site Editor and content writer for My VoIP Provider.