Mobile Roaming: Cheapest Calls When You're Abroad

NFH

seaviewing wrote: »

It *has* to be a mistake surely, incoming call charges in Thailand 7ppm (vodafone 75ppm)?

I don't see why they're mistakes. There's no economic reason for any charges for incoming calls to exceed the lowest retail prices for calls to non-UK mobiles. Vodafone's price is simply unreasonable and is unrelated to cost. The termination rate incurred for calling a Thai mobile number is negligible and one would reasonably expect a correlation.

NFH

Sainsbury's Mobile's free incoming roaming countries include all GCC countries. This is the only pattern I can see. It could be useful for someone who travels a lot to the Gulf and doesn't need mobile data or outgoing calls.

Stephen7372

Arrrrrrrrrrggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh !

youngfreeandsingle

Going to Turkey in a fortnight, first time without my daughter and will be calling home every evening, I have access to 3 pay as you go, orange pay as you go, and virgin on contract. What is the cheapest way for me to call home please.

grumbler

The cheapest way is always a smartphone and free WiFi.
The next cheapest is usually a local sim and a local international calling card (or they call you from UK - the rates start from 15p+7p/min or 12p/min)

nickb99

I would be interested in any suggestions for my particular situation. I will be living in Amsterdam and travelling back to the uk every few months. I use more data than calls or texts. I have a Dutch sim (Lycamobile) but discovered to my disappointment that they don't don't offer data when roaming in the UK So I bought a Uk sim (Lebara) but found that they expire after just 84 days if unused. Also it was not a perfect solution (yet another nnumber to manage). I looked at the Travel talk global sim (which would give me a uk and a Dutch number) but the data prices look very high. So any other suggestions? Best would be one sim I can leave in all the time but that offers both a Dutch and uk number, plus reasonable data rates.

grumbler

nickb99 wrote: »

I use more data than calls or texts.

This is meaningless.

...So I bought a Uk sim (Lebara) but found that they expire after just 84 days if unused. Also it was not a perfect solution (yet another nnumber to manage).

And how much do they charge for roaming? I see 45p/MB :eek:

Most likely there are better solutions, but even Toggle Mobile charge 15p/Mb and very little for calls/texts.

I think you are unlikely to find a good sim for use in both countries until roaming charges are abolished in EU (Dec 2015?). It's worth thinking about getting a dual sim phone for now.

Stephen7372

Roaming Tariffs
Thanks to EU roaming rules, the cost of making and receiving calls when abroad in the EU is now substantially cheaper than in 2007, when the EU first started to tackle excessive roaming charges.
The maximum tariffs (excluding VAT) for calls, texts and downloading data are:


1 July 2014
Outgoing voice calls (per minute)
€0.19
Incoming voice calls (per minute)
€0.05
Outgoing texts (per SMS message)
€0.06
Online (data download, per MB*)
€0.20
*The tariff is per Megabyte to download data or browse the Internet whilst travelling abroad (charged per Kilobyte used).

nickb99

Hi Stephen. Thanks for that info, very interesting. If those are the maximums how come the 'world sim' type of products typically charge a higher rate? Because they are based outside the EU perhaps?

mrcamp

Any world Sim based in the EU will likely not charge higher rates than the EU mandated rates. And even those based outside the EU that charge higher rates, probably will market to customers outside the EU. with these lower rates, most EU based customers traveling within the EU should have no use for an international SIM.

nickb99 wrote: »

Hi Stephen. Thanks for that info, very interesting. If those are the maximums how come the 'world sim' type of products typically charge a higher rate? Because they are based outside the EU perhaps?