SIM for occasional use on tablet

Cantata

Cantata

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I need a SIM to use occasionally on an iPad that is 99% of the time working on WiFi.
I don't want a contract, and I don't want a PAYG SIM where unused credit evaporates after a month.
There was a long thread about this early last year as a result of which I got a T-Mobile SIM which was intended for use on an iPhone with heavy phone use and light 'reasonable' web access. This lasted me for a year but on its anniversary it decided that was that.
Does anyone know of any current deals that would provide what I need?
 
I have a Samba Sim in my iPad. For the sake of watching a few adverts, I have enough for the occasional off wifi use. I've currently got 270Mb in the bank/battery.
 
Cantata said:
I need a SIM to use occasionally on an iPad that is 99% of the time working on WiFi.
I don't want a contract, and I don't want a PAYG SIM where unused credit evaporates after a month.
There was a long thread about this early last year as a result of which I got a T-Mobile SIM which was intended for use on an iPhone with heavy phone use and light 'reasonable' web access. This lasted me for a year but on its anniversary it decided that was that.
Does anyone know of any current deals that would provide what I need?
Click to expand...

A PAYG SIM from Vodafone or TMO/Orange should be fine as long as you remember to use it every month, even if you only call it from another phone. You'll lose any credit if there's no activity on the network over a period, but otherwise it should be usable for years.
 
I too had 2 of the TMobile sims referred to bit never got them to work.
I use GiffGaff for occasional use. You can load it with credit that never expires.
Not particularly cheap in use though.
 
I tried using the tethering on my my smart phone and using the data allowance I'm already paying for, which is from Talk mobile using the Vodaphone network, great at home when I set it up. But only to find that the Vodaphone 3G coverage was pretty useless in the Medway and Swale area particularly in the evening when I wanted to use it. My daughter's iphone on O2 seems to suffer much the same in the same area. I ended up buying a £10 PAYG mobile broadband sim from 3 mobile and only topping it up during the summer months when I'm likely to be on the boat or at our holiday home. Yes I do lose money at the end of each month, but it still seems to be the cheapest way I could find of getting a good 3G connection.

I did first mess up and "bought" a free 3mobile PAYG sim off ebay as it appeared I could top it up from £7.50 per month. After a lot of messing around registering it, as you can't receive the password text on an ipad, I managed to top it up using the ipad, only to get a message on the screen a few hours later to be told to return the sim to my phone. After a lot of being passed petween 3's Indian customer service reps I eventually found that the card cold only be used in a phone and not in an ipad.
 
I use a PAYG sim from 3 which gives 3gig and lasts for 3 months.I buy mine from Amazon at around £11/12 pounds.I know you said that you didn't want PAYG but the 3g ones are good value at that price.I use mine on the boat and have not yet used up all the 3g in the 3 month period.
 
i bought a vodaphone sim , waste of time and money , tether to my mobile now on orange , far superior to the voda sim , that was next to useless , if it didnt have a full signal which it rarely did !!! it would tell you you had no credit , which I did .by comparisson tethering to mobile was a breeze , even watched olympics going through dorus mor and over at corryvrechan ,

as you can guess , I sail west coat of scotaland from clyde to skye and would thoroughly reccomend orange for phone and i pad through experience against voda.
 
agurney said:
A PAYG SIM from Vodafone or TMO/Orange should be fine as long as you remember to use it every month, even if you only call it from another phone. You'll lose any credit if there's no activity on the network over a period, but otherwise it should be usable for years.
Click to expand...

Yes, my understanding was always that once per six months (either brief use or top-up) is enough to keep the account valid, and my credit does not seem to evaporate. I have had my Vodafone PAYG SIM for years and rarely use it, and never for data.

Mike.
 
ditchcrawler said:
I use a PAYG sim from 3 which gives 3gig and lasts for 3 months.I buy mine from Amazon at around £11/12 pounds.I know you said that you didn't want PAYG but the 3g ones are good value at that price.I use mine on the boat and have not yet used up all the 3g in the 3 month period.
Click to expand...

Same detail, I've found the 3 sim to be the most economical way to access the web on an IPad for occasional use.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Three-Mobil...WXY/ref=sr_ob_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1372784462&sr=8-5

For my steam net book I have one of the Vodaphone sims (now not available) which doesn't run out but at £15 a Gigawhatnot it is a bit pricey.
 
Last edited:
Thanks for all the suggestions. Went to T-Mobile shop to ask what plan I'd been on, seems it was a 'buy as you consume' deal that is NLA. Couldn't tell me what plan they had put me on instead. Not good.
So I'm going to use a 3Network SIM in a MiFi for the time being, drawback being that the credit only lasts one month from first use, unless you spend more and buy more capacity than I did.
And daveyw has kindly organised me a GiffGaff SIM too so I shall give that a go later.
 
Cantata said:
Thanks for all the suggestions. Went to T-Mobile shop to ask what plan I'd been on, seems it was a 'buy as you consume' deal that is NLA. Couldn't tell me what plan they had put me on instead. Not good.
So I'm going to use a 3Network SIM in a MiFi for the time being, drawback being that the credit only lasts one month from first use, unless you spend more and buy more capacity than I did.
And daveyw has kindly organised me a GiffGaff SIM too so I shall give that a go later.
Click to expand...

Is it a data sim for an iPad? I'm not sure, but I think you have to buy their data goodybags to use data on a tablet..... Which defeats the object if I understand what you are looking for.
 
daveyw said:
Giffgaff. Free sim. Credit never expires. Pm your address and I'll send you one and I get a fiver!
Click to expand...

Wouldnt touch Giff gaff with a bargepole: I got one for my Lenovo Tablet. It would not even connect without elaborate reprogramming. I tried to set up a user account, and it locked me out of both the system and the Lenovo. I was quite unable to get any help from the so called help lines; nobody ever bothered to reply.

I had originally put the 3 Sim out of my phone in the Lenovo, and it worked instantly setting itself up automatically. When I tried again after Giff gaff it took me nearly half an hour to figure out what Giff Gaff had changed, and switch it all back so that it worked with anything else. Same thing happened when i tried putting the Giff Gaff card in my unlocked phone, it locked it to Giff Gaff and it took a whole evening to restore the phone defaults without deleting everything else. Even now it occasionally re-appears unexpectedly with something else that needs removing!

Pity, because its the best deal.
 
It might be worth looking at Ovivo. It costs £15 for a SIM card, but that gets added as credit. You then either get 750Mb of data per month, or 150 minutes, 250 texts and 500Mb of data at no extra cost per month. The credit does not expire providing you use it every now and then. They support this by showing adverts briefly when you first start browsing, but they are by no means over the top and I actually rarely see them for some reason. They don't intrude on anything else, so you can use email and other internet services without seeing any at all. Their call and text charges outside the allowance are also reasonable. More details here: http://ovivomobile.com/

The only downside for me at the moment is they use the Vodafone network, which doesn't appear to be all that wonderful for 3G data coverage in more remote areas, but it works fine in towns. Considering the only cost is the initial price of the SIM card, then if it doesn't work out you don't stand to lost much.
 
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