Best sim option for france/spain

croftlands

Hi my parents are going on holiday to spain in September but hey are driving!
So i want to give them an old mobile i have lying about so that they're not stuck if they breakdown or anything.

So what's you're recommendations for a sim they may make the odd call home to say they have arrived ect but it would be manly for emergency purposes.

Thanks Dave

croftlands

Dose anyone have any ideas?

nomoneytoday

You can get PAYG sims from Lichtenstein with no roaming charges for £10-£20, and then about 20-30p a minute to make a call.

However, for an emergency only phone it may be cheaper to use a PAYG sim from the uk at £1 a minute if you are not intending on making normal calls too. You need to make about 20-30 mins of calls to "break even"

Here are some examples:

http://www.sim4travel.com/
http://www.0044.co.uk/
http://www.globalsimcard.co.uk/
http://www.oneroam.co.uk/

mouseclick

Add to that list
http://www.united-mobile.com

I have just been given a free upgrade to a United Mobile Plus card, which has a "UK" number. But there are always catches, and in fact this UK number begins 07937. Now O2 are 07936, and O2 are 07938, but, as redux pointed out to me, 07937 are Jersey Telecom, which some mobile networks charge an international rate for, and some don't!

Anyway, it's an option, check out their website, incoming calls are free, outgoing calls are 19p a min to Spain or UK. There is a 17p call set up. Per minute billing.

The big question for this type of card is - how old is the phone, and how old are your parents? Older phones may require some tricky "menu dialling", and older people who are less technology inclined cannot cope with this! Also, is the phone unlocked? I presume you know it has to be, if you are going to use a SIM card from another network.

As nomoneytoday says, a simple solution may be to buy a UK SIM. Especially if it is only to be used for possible emergency calls such as running out of gas, as opposed to International gas gas gas. O2 PAYG are cheap from abroad.

peterstannard

Try Vodafone PAYG (with Passport add-on which is a free add-on). You pay a 75p connection charge per call made/recieved after which you pay the normal UK rates Vodafone charge.

faza20

You can get more information on Vodafone Passport here

croftlands

Thanks Guy's will have a look at the links.

dellwear

faza20 wrote: »

You can get more information on Vodafone Passport here

O2 have a scheme called MyEurope that reduced the cost of roaming in the EU. They also have a scheme called Chosen country - Spain that you can subscribe to that will remove the cost of reciving calls and reduce further the cost of calls/texts - it's £5 a month but worth looking at I think

pigeonpie

AFAIK Tesco are 35p a min to make calls to the UK (min charge 1min) and O2 about the same from France and Spain with My Europe bolt on. Roaming prices have to come down by end July owing to an EU directive (I think).