I love making Skype calls on the N900 (i bought an online number from skype which works great as well) - however, I'm unable to add a + before their number in the contacts area. That means I need to manually input their number every time i want to make a skype call since skype needs the + to make a phone call.

thanks for any advice.

Can you specify what is the problem? I have added + before the number (I do this nearly every time I add a phone number) and there were no problems. The + -symbol I use comes from the keyboard, but you need to press the function key (leftmost column, middle row) once before you get the + -sign from the s-key. Mine N900 has scandinavian keyboard, that should not make a difference in this case.

Tap the * key twice

Ok then, something is wrong w/my N900 as I am unable to type a + in the phone number field of my contacts. I can only type a number. Sorry for posting this - it's just a problem w/my phone.

On mine if I try pressing the function key and then the + nothing appears, but if you don't press the function at all when entering details in the phone number field pressing s makes a + appear.

Input fields in Hildon can be marked as "numeric only". This is what Contacts does for the phone number fields.

This means that +, 0-9, 'p' (and probably * and #) can be typed without pressing the blue arrow. Unfortunately, this handy convenient shortcut becomes a mis-feature when it doesn't work with the blue arrow (as you've found).