Thanks. What kind of software do you use to read your SIM? I would like to cross check what that tool says for my SIM cards that according to my good old Nokia N95 have a EHPLMN list.

I will try to get a replacement of my "main" SIM now. From then on I´ll only get IMSIs for my "core" countries. Furthermore I´l get a second SIM to use in remote countries that I rarely go to.

I hope the SIM-replacement will work out :)

PS - anyone managed to get a Belgian number/IMSI working?

(another) typical Toggle: Local numbers from AT, RO and BE disappeared again, they're no longer in the menu.

Gr8.

I use one of the cyan 5€ USB SIM readers from Amazon and a home made Windows software. If you want to give it a try, you can get it here.

It only works with low cost Phoenix style readers. Not with more expensive PC/SC readers.

Open a CMD window and specify the COM port number of the reader (you can find it in the device manager) and the PIN, for example (COM10 and PIN 1234):
cardread -port=10 -PIN=1234

We're just back from Europe. I used Toggle for the first time there, initially in the UK and then in France.

There are tons of options in the UK but Toggle works well, calls home to Canada inexpensively, and has inexpensive local data add-ons. I was very pleased with it there.

In France, the situation is more complicated. Prepaid SIMs are a bit trickier to get. Lyca and lebara goth have good options. But you know what? I found Toggle to be perfectly satisfactory. I wish you could buy a smaller block of data than a gigabyte (a half gig would have done me fine) but the rates were reasonable enough for data, and the voice rates were great. The local French number came in quite handy when we had an issue with our rented flat and our property manager wanted a way to reach us.

I'll definitely be keeping my Toggle SIMs alive to use again, even though we don't travel abroad that often. And hopefully Canada is added to the list of countries with good rates - it would be great to give travelers here a better option than is available now.

Hello

I came from Portugal and receiving calls to the Spanish toggle number were free of charge (as you already confirmed me :D)

On the other hand, I had a problem that also happened to me while in France last year: some calls (just few of them) are finished without a reason.

I´ve been using an old Nokia now and also a another similar handset in France.

Calling parties had differents handsets this time and were using even different networks in Spain (Vodafone ES to call to France and Yoigo ES to call to Portugal)

Did anyone have such issues?

Regards

I have from time to time a call where as soon as it is connected, one only hears noise or only one direction audio. However in my case the calls that are established correctly never have been terminated without a reason.

I have seen a recent Lycamobile SIM. In the SIM toolkit menu there are the following 20 selections preloaded:

Roaming
Spain
Netherlands
Australia
UK
Norway
Denmark
Sweden
Germany
Poland
Ireland
France
Switzerland
Portugal
Belgium
USA
Italy
Austria
Romania
Hongkong

All Lyca countries except Tunisia. Obviously they have increased the number of possible identities on a SIM. I would assume that somebody that orders a replacement SIM for Toggle today would get a new SIM without the previous limitation to 10 identities.

Does this mean toggle isn't needed anymore?

Any Lyca sim now offers the same service?

What about the rates?

No. While Lycamobile obviously uses the technology developed for and proven by the toggle project to evade roaming costs across their markets, Lycamobile has different tariffs which cannot compete with toggle's traveller-friendly pricing.

I have from the new batch and it has all the countries as an IMSI, however it has only the original countries on the registration online, so it doesn't work in those countries.

I would say that also with Toggle, a local identity (if present or loaded on the SIM) is used in all 19 Lyca countries. However they do not give you Toggle-Country pricing in all countries, but only in some of them where also a local phone number is available.

As far as I understand, Lycamobile offers some of the home country conditions in all 19 mentioned countries (http://www.lycamobile.co.uk/en/roaming-sim-card):
- Free incoming calls in all 19 countries. I have verified this in some EU countries.
- Outgoing calls at rates that are used in home country in the case when no call bundle is booked. I have verified this in some EU countries.
- Bundles for calls/SMS that can be booked for use in roaming in all 18 countries (EU Plus, UK Plan). Also usable in home country.
- Bundles for data that can be booked for use in some roaming countries (HOME DATA). Some of them also usable in home country.

For some users this offer might be better than Toggle offer especially when no local number is required. For roaming outside of the 19 Lyca countries Toggle has some better tariffs. As always with Lyca do not expect the things to work always. It appears to me that they do not order the necessary configuration (APN,...) from the network operators until the first user tries to use it and complains. At least it happens to me in many countries that for example the APN of other Lyca country is not permited for local IMSI and sometimes the problem is not resolved during the time I am present in a country.

As far as the EU is concerned, it looks like we will be getting some really attractive roaming offers on the postpaid plans. Whoever will have access to those will probably not require prepaid cards for EU-roaming anymore.

In Germany the Telekom included EU-Roaming without surcharge in its higher priced Magenta tariffs. Vodafone Spain removed roaming charges for EU/EEA, Switzerland, USA, Turkey and Albania in all its postpaid tariffs (http://www.vodafone.es/conocenos/es/...e-precios-con/). So one can get 1,5GB data usable in all mentioned countries for 14 Euro monthly:

http://www.adslzone.net/app/uploads/...n1-715x310.png

I'm in the US currently and incoming calls occassionally come with an incorrect caller ID where the international country code is simply omitted.
So a German number starting with +491573.... (a mobile number) turns into +1573... and so appears to be originating from Missouri, USA.
This issue has occured in the past but what's really interesting is what customer care say about it:

How can it not be an issue when I cannot distinguish which continent is a call coming from?

This happens to me when receiving calls from the USA on my German non-mobile number. They very often appear as xxx-xxx-xxxx without the one or 001 in front of them.

This is a general problem with many (all ?) different providers when roaming, depending on the countries.

I guess toggle is saying this isn't an issue because they can't do anything about it on their end?

I am wondering, what will be the roaming rates for non Toggle-Mobile countries from 1st of may 2016? The calculator at their website still shows the recent prices...

BK

Toggle has always been late implementing EU-regulated tariffs. Probably waiting until somebody complains with Ofcom.

In any case, as the calls from UK to UK (and to many EU-landlines) cost 3p/min, calls from non-toggle EU-Countries to the UK should not be allowed to cost more than 8p/min. In many countries they are still listed with 18p/min.

If you look at Lycamobile prices, they seem to have disabled data roaming in regulated tariff, so that one is forced to book a data roaming package which in most of the cases is more expensive than the regulated tariff would be. Not really user friendly.

Does anyone know what the "real" prerequisites for obtaining the Lyca "Feel-Like-Home" service on a normal Lyca-SIM are?

My dilemma:

• I have a Swiss number which I would like to keep AND receive calls on this number internationally.
• Porting to Toggle is not supported

I got a Lyca-SIM, recharged 5 Francs, it's activated and works in the Swiss network. However, I could not even log into any foreign network. Customer Service doesn't care much. I have a feeling Lyca doesn't care about details, as long as the mass-market keeps going.

Long story short: Is there a way to reliably use "Feel-Like-Home"?

You should be able to login into foreign networks using local identities like in the case of Toggle. Maybe the phone does not support SIM toolkit correctly. In such a case you should select manually the required identity/country.

As I mentioned before, a recent Lyca SIM that I have tested had 20 identities preloaded that could be selected. Keep in mind that Lyca SIM lifetime is short if not used/recharged often, so you might lose the number if not careful enough. Maybe using call forwarding to Toggle for your existing number would be an option.

Wow, that's what I needed to know. I didn't even know this SIM has one.

Will be able to check in Germany on Monday!

Thanks!

I recently had the opportunity to speak to a senior Lycamobile representative who told me that it was decided to no longer actively market toggle and that it will probably be phased out at some point of time. He cited the failure to attract high-volume customers and the unreliability of the automatic IMSI switching performed by the STK application as main concerns that have led to the decision. As an alternative he suggested Lyca 2 in 1 which however is only available to British Lycamobile SIM cards that can have a Polish and Irish MSISDN/IMSI added. Funnily this service again relies on STK for IMSI switching.

Thanks, inquisitor, for the insight!

How do they want to attract "high volume" customers, if the product isn't reliable in the first place?

Had I known for sure that the product is supported, AND had they allowed porting in German+Swiss numbers (and other numbers), AND add meaningful international data-packages, I might have switched my main numbers to one single card. It would've beed perfect.

But trying to market an incomplete product, then complain that there's no uptake?!

Strange strategy!

With this new info, all Lyca is finally out the window for me. After all, customers never know what will happen tomorrow.

Toggle has finally published the rates to adapt to the new EU roaming regulation valid since April 30th. Although the rate list shows various rates for the same item, the rates from most Toggle countries to Toggle countries seem to be:

Landline/mobile: 7p/min
SMS: 5p/min
Data: 18p/MB

From non-Toggle EU to Toggle the rates seem to be:
Landline/mobile: 18p/min
SMS: 5p/min
Data: 17p/MB

Far over the rates of many EU prepaid SIMs that today offer the following from any (except home) EU to any EU country:
Landline/mobile: 4p/min
SMS: 1p/min
Data: 4p/MB

Aside from the UK networks, which EU prepaid sim cards are offering those rates? I've looked around and have not been able to find any!

I haven't checked it lately, however in May the German Telekom prepaid (including Congstar) and Spanish Orange and Movistar had these prices without the need to book any domestic package. The German Telekom is scraping surcharges completely when a domestic package is booked in October.

Thanks. It seems that T-Mobile DE (I assume that's what you meant) does not charge the base rates but Orange ES and Movistar ES still seem to.

Toggle has now increased the rates within the UK to 7 p/min for UK landline and mobiles, matching the rates in other Toggle countries.

I phoned up to ask about this, and was told that the increase was mandated by regulators. You can well imagine that I called this as untrue, and said I thought it cynical of the company to brief its staff to lie to customers.

Rates are now double certain rivals within the UK, and UK customers roaming in Europe calls to UK are 2 to 4 times the rates of UK main networks.

However, calls from Toggle countries to the other Toggle countries plus others are still priced at 3p to landlines, 9p to mobiles, so perhaps using calltrough will help some people.

Of course the regulator does not mandate price increase. However there are other limitations that come from regulation and affect prices. Here are two examples:

1.
The new EU roaming regulation mandates that the reference price for all calls in the EU roaming is the off-net price within the home country. In the case of Toggle, that is the UK->UK price. All caps for EU roaming are calculated relative to this price. So maybe instead of lowering the roaming prices, Toggle rised the home price in order to get compliant. Even so, there are many prices for the EU roaming where Toggle apparently charges more than allowed by the regulation.
The maximum prices from any EU country (except UK) to any EU country in the case of Toggle should be:
Voice: 13p/min
SMS: 5p/min
Data: 20p/MB
Incoming: 1p/min
Just been to Portugal, where the SMS from Toggle indicates 18p/min for calls. In Croatia the SMS indicates 67p/MB for Data, 28p/min for calls, 7p/min for incoming and 8p/SMS. All above the limits.

2.
Although the termination rates within the EU have been regulated close to 0,01€/min, that is only valid for the calls originating and terminating within the EEA. More and more operators charge much higher termination rates for the calls delivered from the operators outside the EEA and for the calls where the originator is outside the EEA even though the call passes through an EEA operator (mentioned here: https://www.technologyslegaledge.com...ination-rates/). In general this makes it more difficult for the operators to use low cost routes. Maybe Lycamobile, that is handling many non-EEA calls has difficulties to get the lower termination rates.

You may be right, but they seem to be quite mixed up about implementation for EU countries

Website has outgoing rates of 3p, 7p, 9p, 18p, 28p; incoming 0, 4p, 7p, 19p

I live in the UK and have had a Toggle Mobile SIM for two years. Despite the 7p per minute pricing on their website, the occasional call I make to an UK mobile or landline is still charged at 3p. I wonder whether this means the 7p are only being charged to new customers or simply the new rate is not still in effect.

£5 per year for a foreign mobile number where you can received calls for free while roaming is an excellent price. The cheapest competitor I have found charges £5 per month. I hope the do not increase this price. I have been using one from Spain and another from the USA to receive calls here in the UK and the quality is excellent.

A question about getting a new replacement SIM. I asked customer service a few months ago and they said that I just need to buy a new SIM and they will transfer to it the number and balance of my current Toggle SIM. Unfortunately they can only transfer the UK number, so I would lose the Spanish and US numbers.

Has anybody been in this situation?

I have some doubts as to whether the CS rep simply read that foreign numbers cannot be ported to the UK SIM, because I cannot understand why they cannot simply point the existing numbers to the new SIM as they do with the UK number.

I'm tempted to try and see what happens as I would like to get one of the new SIMs with 20 IMSIs, but to be honest, the Spanish number is a very easy to remember one and I would not like to lose it.

Curiously enough, does anybody know how do they transfer the call to a foreign number to the UK SIM? I thought they were simply linked to the country's IMSI, but I have realised that when there is an incoming call to any of the foreign numbers my phone shows it as "forwarded call", whereas calls to the main UK number are not. I understand that that this may mean that they simply forward the foreign number to the UK number and the IMSI is only used for roaming purposes but unrelated to the foreign number. Something in this direction may be the fact that, after getting a temporary number and IMSI for France, I let it expire but regardless of not having the French number anymore, when I visited France I received the text with the toggle country rates just because the IMSI was still in my SIM. And in fact, although they say you need a local number to get those rates, I could call and was charged those rates without the French local number.

yes, as long as the IMSI is on the card you will get the "local" rates.
I assume you are also right about the method of using the foreign numbers as they really always show up as a forwarded call.

I've raised that question to Customer Support quite some time back and got the answer, that any number but the one of the network the SIM was booked in latest, could be transferred to a new SIM card.

In my case this means, if my SIM was registered in the swiss network (home network) they can transfer my UK, German, Spanish and US number to the new SIM, but not the Swiss one. Therefor I never spread my local numbers to anyone, only the UK number....

BK

Do the EU roaming rates cover promos and specials? If not, I can see base rates going up but being offset by more promos or bundling of free wifi access in the home country.

Yes, promos and specials count for EU roaming. What you would pay for a call/text from your home network to another network in the same country (the actual price, does not matter whether discounted or not) is what has to be charged in the EU for calls/texts (a surcharge is allowed until mid of this year).

On-net prices (from home network to home network) do not have any influence on roaming prices so those can be lower or with higher minutes limits.

For data the operators anyhow got many possibilities to limit the amount that can be used in EU roaming without surcharge. What they still can do, is to separate packages to a call/text part and a data part. As the price for the data package would be lower in this case than for the complete package, one would get less data without surcharge in roaming.

I have contacted cs again and here is their reply:

Further to your email, we would like to let you know that you can transfer you Toggle mobile number and the credit to your other Toggle SIM card. However, the process of transferring the number and the credit takes up to 5 working days and local numbers cannot be retained.

I'll test with a secondary card where I don't mind losing the local number, and see what happens.

An update on this. After three days Toggle Mobile has deactivated my old SIM card, but the new SIM still shows its original number and zero balance.

Probably it will stay like that for a few days, but I cannot say I did not expect it. I ported some time ago a mobile number to Toggle and it took a 5 days since they disconnected the number from the old company until it was working on the Toggle SIM.

Basically, they take their time!

Has anyone recently roamed in the US? I realize that Lycamobile supports 4G in the US and wonder if toggle SIM cards would be allowed onto T-Mobile's 4G network there.

Well, SIM transfer completed. Main UK number and balance available on new SIM. None of the local numbers have been transferred, so, I can confirm that SIM change means loss of local numbers. All of them, both those for which you pay £5 per year and the 30-day free ones.

I admit that I just wanted to change SIM because of the higher capacity of the new SIM, but since I intended to use a couple of the local numbers for business, my concern is that if at any point in the future the SIM stops working and I need a replacement, I will lose valuable numbers. The obvious answer is don't use Toggle for business. Quite sad because there are not many alternatives if you need mobile numbers from different countries. Not very happy with it :confused:

In germany now and data doesnt seem to be working. Im connected to Vodafone 3g network. Can anyone confirm its working?