Hmm, shouldn't Callkey SMSC support the "national format" "within" +44 zone?
Anyway, is sending SMS to numbers beginning with leading zero (like 07786) inside UK possible? E.g. in Poland using leading zero is not valid when sending an SMS even if it's valid when dialing a voice call. 501x, +48501x or 0048501x are OK for all purposes but 0501x is invalid for SMS., good for voice calls only (and Era doesn't support leading zeros at all).

Didn't see anyone else mention this, but a GSM phone will not work in Japan. A GSM SIM may work in Japan if you have a WCDMA 3G phone. If your phone did not have WCDMA then it was the problem. The SIM might have worked fine.

Has anyone used 09 in Japan? What did it cost?

I just ordered an 09 SIM from SIMPhoneE.com because they claimed 2-3 day shipping. This SIM interested me because of their long list of free-incoming countries (including Mexico). I also plan to test it on my next trip to Japan.

Does anyone know the minimum activity needed to keep the phone alive. Will a 39cts call to customer service do it?

How is SMS working these days?

SMS does not work at all.
One call per 9 months seems to be enough. I just called my german homephone for 39ct to keep the SIM alive the last time.

Chris

Remember two big problems with O9...

1. No voice mail

2. Believe it or not, no coverage in Switzerland a major hole in its coverage and perhaps the only international card without a roaming partner in Switzerland that I know of.

That was even a big pro when i searched for my card.
Germans hate answering machines cause you burn money without actually speaking to the real person and the person burns money to call the answering machine and hear the recording "Damn answering machine arrgghh this cost 25 ct a minute arrghhh". ;-)

Chris

I received my 09 SIM yesterday. I had ordered it from SIMphoneE.com because they could get it to me within 3 days and I'm leaving on a cruise this morning.

So far I'm pretty disappointed. While the SIM registers on both Cingular and T-Mobile,

1. I tried sending a SMS to the number using both T-Mobile & smsBug. Neither arrived.

2. I tried ringing the number using 4 different international carriers (including AT&T and MCI) all failed. The phone never rang.

3. I tried calling the 092 short code to get the balance. I got the ringback but only silence where the balance report should have been.

I contacted SIMphoneE about these issues but have not seen a response yet. I hope the problem is related to the fact that the SIM I received has a different phone number than what was stated on the invoice. Maybe this SIM has not been properly activated yet. I don't know. I sure hope it gets fixed quickly or I'll feel like a fool for paying $20 extra for 2nd day air shipment.

Suggestions?

The sim does not yes accept sms. In regard to ringing the number, I have also problems with it from time to time. Mine is also experiencing problems at present in receiving calls, but I can make outgoing calls. I will report after trying various providers.


Edit: After trying a few routes I discovered that none was able to connect to the phone!

I just tried out as well and got a connection within 5-10 seconds using T-Com or BT.
Cheap routes are tricky as usual...


Chris

One route works now also here (OTE).