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I am from the UK and have an unlocked t68i. I will be in Baltimore, MD for 2 months this summer, but cannot afford to use international roaming (approx $1.80 to make call, $0.90 to receive and $0.50 to send SMS)
In the UK you can buy a SIM card from any of the major networks for about $20 and put it in your phone. You then add credit when you need it. I am looking for something similar to this available in the US but can only find deals where you have to buy the phone.
Can anyone help? While in US I would like to be able to send and receive SMS to/from UK, call UK, and receive calls from UK - obviously for less than the costs I've mentioned above. GPRS would be a nice bonus, but is certainly not essential.
I have contacted Cingular, TMobile and AT&T wireless and they are less than helpful. Useful info on the web regarding this is as rare as rocking horse shit.
Any help gratefully received,
thanks in advance.
G.
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Posted: 2003-05-14 22:13:00
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T-mobile does prepay cards (Easy Speak), go into a T-mobile store and ask them. Also i dont think prepay is as cheap here as it is in the UK i think you'll be able to use SMS (free recieve, 10 cents to send a message) but not MMS or GPRS.
$10 per refill 30 minutes 15 days of use
$25 per refill 100 minutes 30 days of use
$50 per refill 250 minutes 60 days of use
$100 per refill 500 minutes 60 days of use
You can get the refill cards like anywhere but im not sure if you can get the sim cards anywhere or just from T-mobile. Also Voicestream here is T-mobile. T-mobile bought out Voicestream a year ago.
If you really cant find out anymore about this i can get you a sim card and prepay minutes.
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Posted: 2003-05-14 22:41:00
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scooterman is right. those are t-mobile's prices and they are the only GSM provider in that area with prepaid. a SIM will cost you $50 and in that will be included $30 worth of airtime. SMS is free recieve, $0.10 to send, and $0.40 per minute for calls (no discounts on nights and weekends, same price all the time). and there is no WAP or GPRS access with prepaid.
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Posted: 2003-05-15 00:03:00
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scooterman : you mean that a prepaid card $10 will expire after 2 weeks even if you have not talked all the minites???
i only use prepaid sim cards ftom Tmobile for international sms and thats it , never talk on that sim .
i got a refill of $10 last week .dont tell me its gonna expire next week
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Posted: 2003-05-15 05:28:00
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yes yes it will expire after 15 days even if you have no used it, sucks huh
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Posted: 2003-05-16 02:31:00
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at&t has a new prepaid plan now called gophone. Loads of free minutes and gprs is available too. www.gophone.com
This message was posted from a P800
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Posted: 2003-05-16 09:18:00
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but AT&T is blocking internatonal sms
your phone says sms send and delivered. you get charged, and the other person recevies 0 sms from you
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Posted: 2003-05-16 17:30:00
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Thanks for the help! Is mush appreciated.
Have to admit that the more I find out about US mobile phones, the more confused I get.
Couldn't work out what next generation was until I realised it's actually GSM. In the UK, 'next generation' refers to the 3G service which began a couple of months ago.
What I think I'll do is wait till I'm over there, then roam with my UK contract for a few days until I can go into a shop and speak to someone direct. The corporate websites really do not provide enough information for someone with my situation, although I wouldn't really expect them to.
But you guys have given me enough ammunition to avoid being totally fleeced by any moby salesman trying to rip-off the out-of-towner.
Cheers,
G.
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Posted: 2003-05-18 17:52:00
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Hi! Just to let you know my experience, with the prepaid SIM card, consider using prepaid long distrance card (they are roughly 2cents a minute ot call UK/Europe). Mobile service in US charges regualr international calling rate, I believe is about $0.45 or more to UK/Europe, of course, over and above airtime.
These cards are available on the internet as well as in the stores in most cities. The inconvience is that one has to dial more numbers, ie, a local number to access teh service; a pass word; then, the international call numbers.
Hope this help!
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Posted: 2003-05-18 18:25:00
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On my t68i there is an option to use calling cards which requires an access number and a password. I was wondering if this has anything to dow ith the cards you mention, as it would save me having to dial the additional numbers manually each time I used it. Also, in the UK only certain freephone numbers are actually freephone from a mobile; are the access numbers for these international dialing cards freephone from a US cellphone?
Cheers,
G.
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Posted: 2003-05-19 20:59:00
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