I have a UM sim and signed up for CBW. I am currently in Portugal, and was using CBW without problems for several days, when all of a sudden, it quit completely. The UM sim works fine, but when I call CBW, I get the first call back from UM, hear the ringing and hang up. Then I usually get no callback from CBW, or, on the rare occasion I do get a call, I can't get them to accept the number I insert, OR connect to the CBW operator as the prompts suggest. My daughter is now having trouble using the 800 number from the US, which was also working perfectly until ~ 3 days ago.

I emailed customer support, and left a message on their voice mail, and haven't heard anything back. Does anyone know if they've gone defunct? Or, any other similar services I could sign up with for the remaining 2 wks of my trip?

Thanks for any help.

CBW is having computer problems right now. For me, we ran up against my credit limit of $50.00, and the computer problems mean they cannot charge my credit card and free up the $50.00 credit limit. This may be the same situation for you.

My companion is over in London, and has resorted to using U-M, at its higher rate.

... and I have resorted to calling the U-M mobile number, rather than the CBW 800 number, to get in touch with her.

Tonight (GMT+2) I wanted to call my brother who is using O2 UK. I ran out of SkypeOut credit. Because topping up SkypeOut may take a while I decided to use CBW. When I called the DID assigned to my Polish landline, I got a message (in Polish) "The call cannot be completed". When I tried to trigger the number from the mobile phone (Orange Poland), I was disconnected after 2 or 3 seconds. Finally, despite the higher rate, I decided to use the Polish 00800 access number (which has never failed me before even when I couldn't receive a callback) - and this number was busy :(.

I tried also to call via Enlinea. One callback was sucessful but didn't connect to the destination number (I heard echo of my voice only). With two next attempt, even callbacks didn't come.....

This has happened before and it took about a week to resolve....but it makes you wonder....cbw and enlinea are wonderful and for the most part when they are up and running are pretty reliable but what is going on to cause these computer crashes...could it be sabotage of some sort by those who are bening undercut...nah couldn't be...could it?

I ran into the exact same issue. I just got back (On Friday) from a trip where I spent most of the time in Lagos, Nigeria. CBW stopped working for me around Tuesday the 10th or so. As you said, if I do get the callback (I was trigerring via a second phone), their system does not recognize when I enter the numbers and hit #, it keeps prompting me to enter the number. Before that though, CBW + UM worked well. My globalsim was definitely a life saver in these situations. It's definitely a good idea to have more than one option.

This is the 2nd time in a year I've gone on a European trip only to find out CBW is not working. Its time for me to find another option as well -- they just are not reliable enough to depend on. If anybody finds a good alternative, please, please post it for us :)

Interesting and I don't know what this means...

Every so often I get stray calls via my CBW account to my UM sim (I assume caused by somebody accidentally dialing my cbw number or whatever)...

Anyway, I was just checking some things today (I'm at home in the USA) and I noted my um account showed 8 messages in voice mail...so I shut the phone off, waited a decent interval to make sure it had de-registered and called via my landline and AT&T ld (11?/minute)...the first voice mail message was today about 1300 US Eastern time and guess what the message was..."Please enter phone number followed by the number sign key now." (the remaining calls in vm were all the same, quickly deleted them)...but the point I'm making does this mean cbw is up and running....yes indeed still can't access the web site to check balances and things like that.

Any info from anybody...I e mailed customer service but haven't yet received a response....

Well, CBW may not neccessarily be up an running. As I posted in the other thread, on my recent trip from which I returned last Friday, during the last 4 days or so, I got the callback, but when I enter the number followed by the # key as asked, it's not recognized, and the system keeps prompting me to enter the number.

You're right...I forgot that I had that happen to me about a year and a half ago....