Opinions on Best SIM card

[elistoughton]

Okay. So it sounds like an international SIM is the clear best bet for multiple countries.

[snidely]

Originally Posted by elistoughton

Okay. So it sounds like an international SIM is the clear best bet for multiple countries.

That is correct. Just want to mention that the govt. run system in Costa Rica does NOT have prepaid.
You would have to use your U.S. carrier, UM, or CelTrek there.

...mike

[elistoughton]

generally, how is roaming on local SIMs in Europe. Do EU nationals stop using their mobiles when they cross borders because of costs?

[MATHA531]

Originally Posted by elistoughton

generally, how is roaming on local SIMs in Europe. Do EU nationals stop using their mobiles when they cross borders because of costs?

The whole thing is evolving very quickly....

In the past (before the advent of the international cards) Europeans either got new sim cards as they crossed international borders or paid very very steep roaming rates....the free reception of calls only occurred while inside the country of the telcom that issued the sim card.

The international cards began changing this...united mobile is only a little more than 2 years old when I stumbled on it after a brief trial with an Irish carrier trying to launch an international card. United Mobile, then called riiing, was the first as I remember to offer free reception of calls throughout most of Western, Central and Eastern Europe west of Russia and also, at least according to its web site, Australia, China and South Africa.

Under pressure from the eu, sort of piggy backing on what happened in the USA experience, pressure began to be brought on European carriers to lower roaming rates. In the USA, lest we forget, the idea of national roaming is less than a decade old. Before then, you had a small local calling region where you made calls from your allotted minutes (and that included receiving calls BTW which remains true till today) and Sprint was sort of the first one to begin offering roaming throughout the country...others followed for competitive reasons and for the most part today in the USA you don't pay ld rates or pay to roam outside your local area (you might even remain on the same company)...some in the eu see the eu as the United States of Europe so to speak (they're a long way from that we know) and want the same thing. Of course cmpanies see this as an erosion on their profits. I mean how can vodafone UK claim they have to charge high rates to compensate Vodafone NL if you roam with your UK sim card in the Netherlands other than to say they have to compensate their roaming partner. In other words you pay to have them transfer money from their left pocket (Vodafone UK) to their right pocket (Vodafone NL) even though they're part of one big happy family.

In any event, the eu Parliament is in the process of lowering roaming rates within the eu to a maximum of 0,24€ to receive calls using another country's sim card. We will see how quickly this can come into effect and whether it will have much effect on local tariffs.

This will resolve the issue for most Europeans it would seem.

[GadgetKen]

As an explanation of why people like to use international call-back sim cards, here's a good article that appeared in the International Herald Tribune a couple of years ago that describes how Riing/United Mobile operates: http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/06/...ess/liecht.php