BY ELAINE DE VALLE

 After direct phone lines to Cuba were cut by the Cuban government, Cubans in South Florida have turned to other ways to reach out and touch someone on the island.

 And that means business is booming for dozens of phone banks at shopping centers from Sweetwater to Hialeah to Little Havana that offer communication to Cuba and
 other Latin American and Caribbean countries -- for less than a dollar a minute.

 Ada Camejo, 59, goes to Hialeah's Pronto Express once or twice a month to call her son and grandchildren. She paid $10.40 for a 12 1/2-minute call last week.

 ``I've been coming here since the [prepaid] cards stopped working.''

 That was soon after Cuban President Fidel Castro cut most of the 1,022 direct lines to Cuba on Dec. 15 following a federal judge's order to award $58 million in damages
 from frozen Cuban assets in U.S. banks to the families of four Brothers to the Rescue volunteers shot down by Cuban MiG fighter planes in 1996.

 Some prepaid phone cards still work.

 But because calls are now routed mostly through third countries, it takes longer and a connection is not always guaranteed.

 Most of the calls are now routed through Canada, Mexico and Italy.

 But some foreign phone companies have stopped connecting South Florida to the island because they can't collect a 10 percent surcharge imposed by Cuba -- which
 earns about $80 million a year in phone fees -- to make up for the $58 million judgment.

 U.S. long-distance carriers that provide service to Cuba -- including AT&T and Sprint -- can't pay the 10 percent surcharge without violating U.S. trade sanctions.

 More customers have turned to phone banks in recent weeks as word spreads of whopping bills for people who called via a 10-10 dial-around number that charged up to
 $7.04 for the first minute and $3.15 a minute after that.

 ``People have lost confidence in calling from home,'' said Orlando Díaz, who used Pronto Express, 4373 W. 16th Ave., for the first time last week.

 The price: 75 cents a minute after a $1 connection fee.

 ``Here, I can come, I call, I pay $10 or $20 right away, and I don't have to think about it again,'' Díaz said.

 The phone banks operate by buying minutes in bulk from long-distance providers and reselling them.

 But it's not their only bread and butter. They also make a profit by shipping packages and wiring money overseas.

 Owner José Pérez estimates that 90 percent of his business is for calls that go to Cuba.

 And Skylight Telemarketing, new on the phone-bank scene, recently opened three locations in Hispanic strongholds.

 At the Sweetwater shop, 300 SW 107th Ave., 10 customers called Cuba in a three-hour period one day last week, paying 99 cents a minute.

 ``And it's slow,'' cashier Dynoska Díaz said.

 ``You should see us on a Sunday.''

 Saturday and Sunday are also the busiest days at Pronto Express, where a line sometimes snakes around the corner of the tiny shopping strip.

 It is not unusual for people to go home without making it to one of three booths dedicated to Cuba, the owner said.

 But while calls to other countries are inexpensive -- 29 cents, for example, for a minute to someone in Peru, Chile, Nicaragua, Colombia or Costa Rica -- Cuba calls are
 still more than twice as much, anywhere between 75 and 99 cents, after a $1 connection fee.

 ``Cuba is different,'' Pérez said.

 ``For Cuba, you have to have a system.''

 ``We have to go through a third country,'' Díaz said from behind the glass cashier booth at Skylight. ``I think it's Italy.''

 The irony of Cuba being closer than, say, Peru was not lost on Maximino Pollato, who called his son, who was visiting his daughter in Cuba, last week.

 ``I told my whole family to move to Guatemala or Chile or some other country,'' he said.

 ``Then we can talk longer.''

                                    © 2001