Vodaphone PAYG Card
 

I bought a Vodafone “CallYa Smartphone Fun 15” card (but nearly didn’t because its absurd name made me want to throw up) for just under 20€. This gives 100 minutes at the Allnet rate, SMS at Flat Allnet and Internet-Flat. I had considered the Aldi card but was put off because I need a nano card and would have had to send away for exchange the SIM that you get in an Aldi supermarket.

As far as I am concerned, the best thing about the Vodafone card is its validity (Laufzeit) of one year. I’ve come from France, where I’m totally p****d off with providers that offer a measly period of validity.

You need to show ID (passport, ID card etc) and also give an address in Germany. I have the latter but as a matter of interest I was not asked to produce a utility bill.

I’d mislaid the pokey thing that you need to open the drawer in the iPhone but the shop assistant was helpful and swapped the cards for me there and then. She also pointed out that the removed French card should be stuck to a piece of paper with Sellotape in case the circuitry on its business side gets scratched.

The card was activated within an hour and can be topped up online.

RN7

Vodafone (further)
 

I had a problem with my (prepaid) Vodafone card in that it would not connect to the Internet although I could make phone calls and send SMS and i-Messages.

When I tried to connect, I got a message (in German) along the lines that Internet usage had been restricted so that I didn’t get a nasty surprise. It gave a link that connected me to the Vodafone site and suggested various tariffs, none of which I wanted – indeed the whole point of getting a prepaid card was to avoid these.

I went back to the shop but they were unable to help (although they used up 10€ of my credit trying to get through to the hotline!) They said that this had never happened before and I suspect that most people opt for an iPhone linked to the Vodafone network and that in these cases there is no restriction. Mine, however, was a direct purchase from Apple.

The Vodafone help forum (https://forum.vodafone.de/), has a chat facility and I was directed to a section devoted to the iPhone5s (“So richten Sie Ihr Handy für das Internet ein” = “How to set up your mobile for the internet”). This can be found at:

https://hilfe.vodafone.de/system/sel...ION_TOPIC_ID=0

I went through the various stages (in Settings) and the iPhone connected. They also offer an automatic set-up called “Handykonfigurator” (Mobile configuration facility), which requires you to enter your Vodafone mobile number. However, I could not get this to accept the number, perhaps because I already have an old Vodafone number.

I use WIFI most of the time and have restricted the cellular data to the bare minimum (mainly Viewranger GPS); so far my credit is holding up well.