Phone Calls at South Central Regional Jail: GettingOut

Two Vendors, and the Split That Confuses Everyone

GettingOut provides the calling and video service. But phone credit is funded through AdvancePay on ConnectNetwork, which is a different website belonging to the same parent company.

A GettingOut account covers messaging, video visits and photo sharing. An AdvancePay balance covers calls to your phone number. Setting up one and expecting it to do the other is the most common false start here, and our send money guide sets out all three accounts side by side.

What Ends a Call

Three-way calling, call forwarding and conference calls are prohibited. The phone system detects them, and the call ends.

This catches families constantly and looks like a technical fault rather than a rule. If your calls keep dropping at the same moment each time, this is the first thing to rule out. Putting a call on speaker in a room with other people is fine; adding another line to it is not.

Also prohibited: calls to other correctional facilities or to anyone incarcerated in a West Virginia facility, and calls to current or former corrections employees, contractors or volunteers, unless the person is an immediate family member and the superintendent has authorised it in writing.

Calls Come Out Only

Inmates cannot receive incoming calls. Calling the jail to ask for someone is not a route that exists, and 304-558-1336 is for confirming custody and asking about visits rather than reaching a person.

The state also states plainly that all calls are prepaid and that staff will not permit inmates to place free calls.

Blocking Your Own Number

If you do not want to receive calls, West Virginia policy provides for a person to have their own number blocked on request. No form or dedicated contact channel is published for it, so the route is to ask GettingOut at 866-516-0115 or the jail directly.

Recording

All calls except attorney calls may be monitored, intercepted, recorded and disclosed, and recordings are kept for at least three years.

Attorney calls are the exception, but the protection is not automatic. Each facility designates a staff member to verify an attorney’s number and enter it into the phone system so that those calls are not recorded. Until that has happened, an attorney call is treated like any other call. If a case is active, it is worth confirming the number has actually been entered.

Rates

No per-minute rate is published anywhere by West Virginia, and its telephone policy names neither a vendor rate nor a cap beyond a general requirement that contract rates be commensurate with those charged to the general public.

We are not going to print a number borrowed from another state’s contract. The rate appears when you set up the AdvancePay or GettingOut account, and 866-516-0115 will tell you before you fund it.

Call Length and How Many

West Virginia sets these per facility rather than statewide, and South Central publishes neither. So the number of calls a day and the length of each are both unconfirmed for this jail. Ask when you set the account up.

Video Visits and Messaging

GettingOut also handles video visits, messaging and photo sharing, with visits available at the facility, from a computer, and from a mobile device at selected facilities. Scheduling runs through the vendor’s own portal.

Photo sharing matters more here than at most jails, because West Virginia does not allow photographs to be sent through the post at all. The tablet is the only route for a photo, which is covered on our mail and photos guide.

If Someone Is Deaf or Hard of Hearing

Assistive technology is provided based on an individual assessment, under the state’s telephone policy. Ask the jail what is available for the specific need rather than assuming a standard setup.