new way to buy your foreign PAYG sim in the UK

[ashley]

Buy your "pay-as-you-go" sim before you leave the UK and hand out your new numbers in advance at <A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.0044.co.uk>http://www.0044.co.uk</A>

<hr width=100% size=1>Live life to the fullest... think of all the people on the Titanic who passed up chocolate dessert.

 

[DavidJ]

Using Spain as an example I notice that for £29.99 you get only €18 worth of calls.
My preference would be to walk into any mobile shop when abroad and buy over the counter.

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[Shakey]

From my own experience, I'd say that makes sense.

When I was in Greece I bought a PAYG sim which had 10 Euro free credit on it, and I took 10 minutes to text my UK friends with my Greek number and still had some credit to spare.

But if you can't be bothered and have some money to spare then I suppose this 0044.com might fill a need.

Horses for courses, i'n't it.

<hr width=100% size=1>It could have been worse - it could have been me.

 

[Steve Clayton]

When in Spain buy an AMENA sim card and an International call card (5 or 10€'s). Use the Int call card to call the UK for 3p a minute. Knocks Vodafone offers into a cocked hat!


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[DavidJ]

Now thats useful Steve, I'll try that
David

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[Steve Clayton]

Just to qualify my earlier posting:

Price of an Amena PAYG card is 26€'s which includes 18€'s of any sort of call be it local or international.
The International call card uses a prefix code before you make your international call and enables calls to be made to the UK for 5 cents a minute. As you start your call your are advised of the call value still left on your card.

I'm not saying this is the best deal around but is the best I've found so far.

As an additional snippet of information if you're over here with laptop/PC access with broadband and need to talk internationally then Skype is the best product I've found for enabling this.



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[ashley]

I was suggesting that buying a sim in the UK allows you to sort out those issues before you leave if that's a worry, as it is for some people, but as you say, horses for courses.
Another point is that you can check it works and get your phone unlocked before you leave as a lengthy call to orange from abroad to unlock your phone will negate any savings you've tried to make

For me though, Skype rocks as they say
As we have no landline but wireless broadband, I reckon i'll reduce my mobile bills France-UK by £200 this month!!

<hr width=100% size=1>Live life to the fullest... think of all the people on the Titanic who passed up chocolate dessert.

 

[Benbow]

Skype

I would be interested to hear your experience with Skype. I am struggling with it from a pretty fast connection in Africa to a UK broadband connection. The "SMS" system works beautifully but the delay on voice is impossible, literally several minutes sometimes. Do you think this is simply a function of network connection speed, or does sheer distance and number of intervening nodes play a role ?

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[Steve Clayton]

Re: Skype

Hi Benbow,

I'm using Skype from Spain and talking primarily to the UK but also to friends in Israel and haven't found it a problem.

It maybe that delays are due to lack of bandwidth from your base station to the recipient however networks can have priorities set so, if for example your instigating a call from a work location, then you might be so low in the priority of what is occurring on the network that your Skype communication seems to run like a dog.

The delays in transmission that you're encountering maybe down to the nodes/servers, etc that your communications are going through from your specific location to the UK. It's like whatever is the weakest link in terms of task priority and throughput results in a slow communication.

As you are in Africa and talking to the UK then there can't be too much of a time difference. You might find that a call is more successful at night-time when your routing back to the UK is not so heavily loaded by other task being performed.

You could try another audio service, eg MSN Messenger (and no, I don't work for Microsoft!) which might use different paths to make the remote connection and find that this works for you

Sorry I can't be of more help - there are companies out there who now make their living in identifying bottlenecks in web applications and then tuning the systems, servers, networks.

One last thought; Try calling me; if the speed is still slow then it is probably at your end; if the speed is OK then it is further up the line in your communication to the broadband connection in UK; but exactly where will take an expert diagnosis!

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[Benbow]

Re: Skype

Thanks for that. I hadn't thought of speaking to the network admin to see if he could raise the priority. I will try that - after all it could potentially save a fortune on phone calls.

Today is a public holiday here and the connection speed is the best I have ever know. Presumably that indicates that the bottleneck is not in the UK.



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[boatless]

Re: Skype

I use it to the States, haven't had that problem - might be network. Have you looked at Skype faqs?

Do find it more natural with headphone/mic (which meant bunging in another old sound card). But suspect that I'll shortly be buying a voip phone. Don't have anyone I need to talk to who's not on broadband, so haven't tried the dial out function yet.

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[ashley]

Re: Skype

Benbow, i think you've answered your own question there: "I'll speak to the network admin"
If you're using skype inside a shared network connection, you're very likely to get delays and bottlenecks. I tend to use mine when the office staff at the boatyard have gone home and have stopped their filesharing programmes. Inside office hours, we get delays often, but you get used to interpolatinmg the missing words and it works OK.
Using skype between one broadband and another is better and sometimes quicker than a normal phone call
Also try calling "echo123" and seeing if you get delays leaving a message

For more help, try the skype forum as it is very active and will have much more help

<hr width=100% size=1>Live life to the fullest... think of all the people on the Titanic who passed up chocolate dessert.