Prepaid DATA in Spain

[gaidal]

Unless someone has had a better experience with simyo than I had, I'd recommend to stay away from their 500mb/€5 plan as it seems to be a lie. No I also didn't think big companies would do things like that, but it looks no better :P Will see if they do something about it now that I complained, but they sure didn't seem very helpful and I'm probably going to try to report the company tomorrow. The customer service is a joke.

Wrote a more detailed post in the simyo thread.

[petkow]

Originally Posted by gaidal

Unless someone has had a better experience with simyo than I had, I'd recommend to stay away from their 500mb/€5 plan as it seems to be a lie.

I still have decent experiences, though their speed seems to be going downhill, at least in in rural areas (even where there is 3G & 3.5G coverage). In my house it used to be good enough for VoIP calls but no longer. However I still have no problems doing VoIP calls anywhere within the city perimeter of Madrid.

But it looks like you do not have a data complaint but a billing complaint! Have you been overcharged? Can you give some details? Remember that it is actually 500mb/€5.80 if you consider VAT! You will get charged at standard rates in (i.e. in small increments) until you hit this level, and then you will no longer get charged per session! Have you been online and checked the data connection details. I would suggest copy-pasting these into excel, summing and reading the bottom lines.

There is an issue that some may not be aware of. The data gets measured in 256kb blocks. In theory therefore if you do 2000 connections of 50k each you will hit your 500MB limit though the real data (as measured by your mobiles data counter) has only been around 100MB. Curious... but is this the issue you are facing?

The customer service is a joke.

Agree 100%.

Wrote a more detailed post in the simyo thread.

Where?

[laptopnomad]

Connected to 3G Yoigo internet - bought it at the PhoneHouse. So far it works pretty well although it's not the cheapest.

Read about my experiences with 3G high speed internet in Spain here.

[gaidal]

Seems like my other post was deleted, I'll summarize it.

Yes you bet it's a billing problem. They have charged me €6.2 so far for about 20 megabytes, and this is in 6 days. I didn't realize that charging in blocks makes every mail check count as 256 kb, and had my iPhone set to fetch every 15 minutes. Even so, I don't have more than maybe 400 blocks *at most*, which would be 100 mb, so why isn't it stopping at €5?
When my friend called them (since I don't speak Spanish) they were just trying to buy time, giving random reasons that made no sense ("you can't be charged more money than you buy for your card" - yeah I know it's prepaid) and saying for instance that "maybe it's better not to use it so much because it's not designed for that". In the end refused to do anything about the fact that I'm being charged too much.

In Sweden I can get 1gb at 7 Mbit for €15, including access to thousands of Wifi spots around Europe, or 500 mb or less for around €10, so I'm pretty disappointed with Spain. :P
Haven't found anything below €25 per month except this one.

[f300]

Ok, I was about to order simyo (.es - heading out to Spain next month) now I'll probably go with 20 EUR Yoigo from the Phonehouse. Any other caveats/updates (BTW good job laptopnomad)?

[petkow]

Isn't the Yoigo one 25 Euros for 3GB? The benefit is that this is on their own network or on Movistar which has good coverage. (all at 3Mbps)
Yoigo - Internet para llevar. Accede a internet en un ordenador desde donde quieras.

Simyo (as I mentioned in the other post) is now 18 EUR for 1GB or 25 for 5GB (3.6Mbps)
simyo - Habla gratis entre número simyo, sólo 8cent/min al resto.Siempre.

Blau is 21,50 for "unlimited" though they throttle after 1GB. (3.6Mbps until then)
blau - Qué es.

Masmovil is getting decent reviews and is a good choice for occasional use at a low 1.5c/512KB. (3.6 Mbps) They have an English website, and English speaking customer service. They are also supposed to have some tariff of 18 Euros per month for 1 GB.
MSmovil: The smart mobile choice

Apart from Yoigo, all of the above are on Orange, who don't have the best coverage and are getting a bit congested in places. Some people are now preferring the move to Vodafone who can get you HSUPA speeds. I think the best one for that is Pepephone who will give you 300MB for 7 Euros or 1GB for 17.99.
pepephone.com - El operador móvil que vuela - Contratación


Just watch out for minimum consumption on all of these, in case you want to keep your SIM active for the next trip. Simyo is still good es there is still no consumo minimo, even though their customer service is shocking!

Also see: Comparativa tarifas internet móvil desde ordenador

[f300]

Originally Posted by petkow

Isn't the Yoigo one 25 Euros for 3GB?

Oh, sure - I meant 20 EUR SIM card ("package") and then use for some days the 3 EUR/day plan until I run out of credit. Good point about minimum consumption, forgot about that. I don't care much about what happens to the card after I leave (same month, March) but I was assuming it'll be good for some months afterward for receiving.

This Pepephone sounds certainly interesting especially if the starting packet/SIM is available for reasonable price/with the right amount of credit included. Is it available at ThePhoneHouse?

[petkow]

Originally Posted by f300

This Pepephone sounds certainly interesting especially if the starting packet/SIM is available for reasonable price/with the right amount of credit included. Is it available at ThePhoneHouse?

No, I don't think so. I think the only places that it is available is Pepephone.com and travel agencies of Halcon Viajes and Viajes Ecuador. There are more than a 1000 of those around Spain. You can look for them here:
Offices of Halcon Viajes
Offices of Viajes Ecuador

[Evan]

Originally Posted by petkow

Isn't the Yoigo one 25 Euros for 3GB? The benefit is that this is on their own network or on Movistar which has good coverage. (all at 3Mbps)
Yoigo - Internet para llevar. Accede a internet en un ordenador desde donde quieras.

Simyo (as I mentioned in the other post) is now 18 EUR for 1GB or 25 for 5GB (3.6Mbps)
simyo - Habla gratis entre número simyo, sólo 8cent/min al resto.Siempre.

Blau is 21,50 for "unlimited" though they throttle after 1GB. (3.6Mbps until then)
blau - Qué es.

Masmovil is getting decent reviews and is a good choice for occasional use at a low 1.5c/512KB. (3.6 Mbps) They have an English website, and English speaking customer service. They are also supposed to have some tariff of 18 Euros per month for 1 GB.
MSmovil: The smart mobile choice

Apart from Yoigo, all of the above are on Orange, who don't have the best coverage and are getting a bit congested in places. Some people are now preferring the move to Vodafone who can get you HSUPA speeds. I think the best one for that is Pepephone who will give you 300MB for 7 Euros or 1GB for 17.99.
pepephone.com - El operador móvil que vuela - Contratación


Just watch out for minimum consumption on all of these, in case you want to keep your SIM active for the next trip. Simyo is still good es there is still no consumo minimo, even though their customer service is shocking!

Also see: Comparativa tarifas internet móvil desde ordenador

Thanks for the valuable overview of the prepaid data options. I will be visiting Spain for a short stay (9 days) so from the above offers, I guess that the best is the one offered by Masmovil.

However, they state on their webpage that in order to activate the data option, you need first to go to your account on the web. This is rather strange, since most mobile operators, have the internet pre-activated and if not, you need to send an SMS or contact the customer service from your mobile. And it's strange, because in order to have internet on your mobile you need to already have access to the internet from a computer

Do you know if this is the only way to have the SIM activated for data? Or if the rest of the providers have the same requirement? I noticed on the Pepephone web site that the internet is possibly pre-activated on the SIM but I'm not so sure since my Spanish are not good at all.

[petkow]

With Masmovil you can activate internet from their website or by calling 1473.