Calling Mobiles Discussion Area

Former_MSE_Dan

This discussion relates to the Calling Mobiles: Sever the price in two article.

Click reply to discuss.

Dustsucks

A word (or two) of warning here: This gets slightly complicated and I may have missed something somewhere but the results are clear. When using a UK mobile phone abroad (in France), to ring a French number it seems your mobile is effectively in the UK so you need to dial the French code i.e 0033 etc. Obviously this costs - both the call to the UK and then back to France. Soooo... I figured that if I used the UK access number for call1899 from France, I could get calls back to France at a fraction of the cost otherwise.

Carefully followed instructions not to press green button again or calls may be charged by mobile operator etc etc. The system worked - no problem - BUT, on checking Orange credit (PAYG phone) after 3 or 4 fairly short 2-3 minute calls it seems that Orange charged over £20 plus the charges through call1899 (which were small). I haven't got to the bottom of the matter yet and as I'm not in France now I can't check it again.

Has anyone information or suggestions?

I should add that I considered buying a French mobile PAYG phone or SIM card but all their systems have a time-to-live built in to the credit you buy as ours did some years ago so it seemed a relatively expensive option (10euros has to be used in 15 days etc.). Not terribly cost effective for someone who only needs to use the 'phone occasionally.

andy88_2

Dustsucks there is no point in doing this when abroad. When roaming (using the phone abroad) your phone is not in the UK and you incur higher charges as you have found. Orange will charge you the same for calls to UK or France. But it is rather off the subject of Martin's articles.

Edinburghlass_2

To any new readers of the Telephone Boards coming to this thread via Martin's article and the email tips, welcome

Should you receive the over subscribed message from 1899 when attempting to register, try again but use your mobile number instead of your landline number. Once you get the welcome email you can go back in and add your landline number.

agmz4

My daughter will be working on a children's camp un USA for 10 weeks. She may have access to a landline in which case she will buy a phone card for calls home. However if I wish to contact her on her mobile, whether by landline or mobile she pays 70p to recieve or make a call per minute. This is with Orange. Has anyone got any ideas how to contact more easily. I already have accounts with 18866 and 1899.

Many thanks. agmz4

Heinz

On arrival in South Africa just before Christmas, my Virgin PAYG logged on and a text welcomed me with:

"Welcome to South Africa. Calls cost £1.70 per minute to make and 80p per minute to receive. Texts cost 35p. For help call 789."

Can't complain at that sort of sevice or that I wasn't aware of call/text costs!

danoneil

agmz4 wrote:

My daughter will be working on a children's camp un USA for 10 weeks. She may have access to a landline in which case she will buy a phone card for calls home. However if I wish to contact her on her mobile, whether by landline or mobile she pays 70p to recieve or make a call per minute. This is with Orange. Has anyone got any ideas how to contact more easily. I already have accounts with 18866 and 1899.

Many thanks. agmz4

I'd imagine her best bet is to buy a PAYG phone while she is in America and then have her text you her new number. I imagine it'll be pretty cheap for her to find a phone out there. She might even be able to get a sim card only if you have an unlocked tri-band phone - if that seems complicated, then she should just get a phone there! Perhaps someone could suggest a network or a couple of US networks then you could dig around on the net to see rough costs of phones out there and make sure she has enough money and that it's not cheaper just to pay the 70p a time!

boblevin

I have been searching for ages to find a way of making cheap calls to the UK from various parts of the world, but have drawn a blank. This seems to me to be a bit odd, as there are so may way of cheap calls to be made from the UK to rest of world. I am sure we are not the only country to have this advantage, especially as many of the low cost carriers are not UK based. Can anyone help?

scattycat_3

Afaik, in the States people are offerred lots of inclusive minutes in their contracts, but are charged heftily for non inclusive mins. It is standard to have to pay for receiving non- American calls. Payphones are extorionate too, so seems our moobiles rates are very competetive on a global scale.

Calls for them back to the States from Europe are so high, that most of the guys I know, have an Orange payg phone (or sim if their US cellphone is tri-band) as calls home with Orange are only 20p/min. Dont know about US payg tho must find out.

HTHs Scat

snoop150

hi i wonder if anyone can help me please, i am going to tenerife on friday and taking two 16 year old girls , i want to ensure that we can contact each other without it costing me a fortune, is it possible to buy/connect to spanish networks ?? i hope i've explained myself and someone can help.
Many Thanks
Emma

andy88_2

Yes, you need to make sure the phones are unlocked - see advice in the sticky threads at the top - and then you can put Spanish SIMs inthe phones. I think there are special tariffs on some of the Spanish networks for best friend/paired/grouped SIMs. I'll look a bit more up for you tomorrow.