I dream of having one phone provider across the world. With reasonable prices for incoming and outgoing calls. With an affordable data plan across the world. Well the data stuff seems quite out of reach today (actually there was a provider in Italy that offered a 1GB UMTS data plan across Europe for 30 Euros a month). However it seems that more and more prepaid providers are popping up that provide much more affordable roaming. Since I moved to Switzerland and starting on a travel intensive job I find myself moving between Switzerland, Germany, Romania and the USA a fair bit. Additionally since I play a fair amount of international Frisbee tournaments I also end up going to most other EU countries and hopefully to Brazil for the beach ultimate world championships next December.
I spend a little bit of time collecting a little list of providers. So far united-mobile seems to be the most attractive to me, since it offers free incoming calls in most countries (though USA is missing). So is the list in no particular order. I would love to hear if anyone has experience with any of these providers or can recommend others:
Briefly on callback services etc. I do not mind having to install some software to get things to work, but I do not want to have to fiddle all too much and I really want this to be integrated well with my other software. So obviously I want to leverage my phone internal phonebook that I sync with my laptop. I also want things like voice dailing to work. Not sure what the state is in this department with the above listed providers.
From what I have heard, United Mobile is the best you're going to get. I had a friend who used Riiing (bought up by UM) and he only had good things to say :)
I miss one crucial information on their website (please point me to it if you see answer to my question there) Which country number I receive with simcard? Do I have a choice or am I limited to one country e.g. Switzerland . If there's no choice there's really no benefit for me. As I wouldn't push my friends calling me on swiss mobile number (it's a bit absurd :) Anyway I've send them message. It would be also good to have possibility of having few numbers e.g. UK one and Polish one.. then really it would be something! :)
With all of these you get a phone number from one country. Like you get an USA number or you get a number from Germany, UK, Island etc. However remember that fixed net calls are pretty cheap even to mobiles these days. Of course if they want to call you from their mobile they will face some steep costs. As a result, these cards are usually not meant to replace your day to day SIM, its only for business trips. Furthermore few of them provide any data access or if at all at very high prices.
To get a number of your choice with an international SIM card, AwayPhone has a unique offering. You get to keep your regular mobile number AND get a local number where you are travelling to. You can have multiple phone numbers on the same SIM.
For details: www.awayphone.com
It is geared to business users and does postpaid billing so you don't need to worry about topping up credit. It is also working on a ringback system (and you need an unlocked compatible mobile to work).
To get around the call-in number issue, you could use a SkypeIn number and have it routed to whichever mobile number you are using. Also, http://www.jajah.com/ offers plugins for *some* mobile phones that give access to their services directly from the mobile. See: http://www.jajah.com/info/tools/mobile/
Any recommendations on a SIM card with good rates for calling back to the US from Switzerland?
I did manage to get my phone unlocked (most mobiles sold in the US are locked to a single carrier), so I have a quad band GSM phone which I know works in Geneva and Zurich.
Cingular's roaming costs are $.99 USD / minute, but as most of the calls I make are back to US numbers that's often cheaper than the Europe->US rates of a local SIM card. (At least it seemed to be for all the SIM cards I looked at last month).
Wherever I have good internet access I just use VOIP (Skype or the Optaros VOIP with a software phone) but I would love to find a cheaper method for calling from Switzerland to the US without internet access.
Please add my company in http://www.roam4free.ie We will be the first card in Europe to add multiple numbers to one sim card.
www.mycherrymobile.co.uk is another and www.oneroam.co.uk
