Prepaid data/voice SIM for France

[powerlifter]

Have you looked at Low-cost Europe cell phones and European SIM cards they have a data plan for France. I have never used them as I think they are to expensive. Make sure you look at the T&C as there is a I think a $60.00 fee per year. That is why i would never use them. Never hurts to give them a look.

[bukzin]

Originally Posted by powerlifter

Have you looked at Low-cost Europe cell phones and European SIM cards they have a data plan for France. I have never used them as I think they are to expensive. Make sure you look at the T&C as there is a I think a $60.00 fee per year. That is why i would never use them. Never hurts to give them a look.

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Just looked over their web site. Its light on details.
Did not see info on data SIM cards usage.

I emailed them (info@callineurope.com) and hope to get more info.

Thanks!

[vegemite]

Is French Orange SIM the best deal found for voice and data so far in France? We'll be there for only a few days, so a hundred or so MB of data would be fantastic.

[bukzin]

Still looking for 'data SIM cards' for France, etc.

Got this response...



Good morning and thank you for your e-mail.

Our partner network in France in SFR.

As for data, with our service you will pay as you go- while in France data usage is charged $5 per megabyte.

I hope this answers your question.

All the best,

Sofiane

Call in Europe

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I saw another company that offered a rate of $2.50 per MB
but not sure who.

[vegemite]

$5 / MB?? What a joke. I am so glad we decided to spend as little time in France as possible, it must be the only country we're having SIM problems with. Geez, you'd get better deals in Nigeria.

[bukzin]

Maybe the phone companies think they can do that
because its one of most visited places on earth.

Power to the people!

[vegemite]

Well makes me glad we're spending the least time in France if this is their attitude. I suspect there is more to it than that. What about 'Orange'? I heard they were ok? Must be some socialist thing they have going on where everything is expensive.

[Motel75]

Originally Posted by vegemite

Well makes me glad we're spending the least time in France if this is their attitude. I suspect there is more to it than that. What about 'Orange'? I heard they were ok? Must be some socialist thing they have going on where everything is expensive.

Orange was indeed OK, when it was an innovative British company competing hard against three others - among other things, it was one of the first mobile providers to provide billing by the second, semi-reasonably priced overseas calls, free calls on weekends, etc. It was also perhaps the first provider anywhere to have a "wacky" name and corporate identity - think how boring it would have been to call it its original planned name, MicroTel.

However, in 1999 Mannesmann bought it, which would probably have ruined it by itself, except that Vodafone then felt stabbed in the back by this and bought Mannesmann, and then had to divest Orange, so it chose a) a company that was willing to overpay in cash and b) a company that was likely to be as weak a competitor as possible. Enter France Telecom, which then rebranded everything as Orange (good thing it's a French word, too). And surely enough, the introduction of the Orange brand to replace Itineris was not accompanied by any of the neat innovation that Orange had been responsible for in the UK. So France remains a market dominated by one state-connected provider with two other firms unwilling to jeopardize their "cash cow" operations by, you know, trying to compete on price or services (which would probably be immediately undercut by Orange, so why bother?). It's a shame, because France has long had one of the lowest mobile penetration rates, along with the lowest SMS and data use rates in Europe.

As for "some socialist thing", France also has a "fourth" state-owned network to provide coverage in rural areas, something that the market has had no problem delivering everywhere else.

[vegemite]

Yep, it's a socialist thing then. So basically because of French socialism we can forget using a phone or GPS while in France? Are there absolutely no semi-affordable pre-paid cards or roaming deals from other countries like 3 UK? I'm so happy I live in a competitive economy sometimes.

[whiterabbit]

Hi everyone. I am a new member here and am actually relocating my business and a few employees to France from the US. I was just planning to use tmobile uk PAYG dongles and paying their monthly Euro booster fee when I am travelling away from my office in rural France. This seems cheap and practical or am I missing something?