Well, it's really less than 8 eurocents/MB and no stupid packets :)!

Oh, yes, so I had quite positive balance at the time I was crossing the border going back home. Since it has no roaming and short expiration time, iPlus will surely get this money for their profit. Too sad... :)

Cheer up - I suppose that after the official expiration date for incoming calls the SIM and the credit will remain valid for the next year. It's not an officially mentioned feature but there are reports it works just like in Simplus :).

Jus thought you all should know, after my rather vigorous defense of Heyah in previous messages, that I'm going to get an iPlus card as well. I have an ex-Voda Moto V980, which is not a great phone but works just fine as a UMTS modem with data cable, albeit only in Poland... I don't think there's a cheaper data deal anywhere.

Do you mean the SIM won't be registered on the network for the next year since the expiration date (no *123... recharge), but it will still be possible to top it up via an ATM to get it awake?

Yes, I do. This is true at least for Simplus and Sami Swoi - the number remains valid for a year after expiration date of incoming calls. In theory all you can do is to top-up, but practically you can also receive calls/SMS. However, when you forget, there's no the way to check when this one-year period really ends :-P.

In fact, iPlus T&C's don't say a word about this feature, but they are reports that it is available. Perhaps, if you can, you should sell the SIM instead of living in uncertainty :).

BTW, what are the first 3 digits of your iPlus - 6xx or 7xx?

Do you mean this half-functionality remains after a top up, so it's impossible to turn the SIM back to it's normal state? Or, do you mean the SIM could be registered on the network (thus allowing to receive calls/SMS or may be *123...) for a year after expiration and could be turn back to it's normal life after any recharge?

Here I can't find the number completely, but I'm sure it's +486... Is it any different from +487...? By the way, there's one strange thing. It was always detected as 6... on the phones that I called, including +7... Russian phones used in Poland (I didn't call Russian phones located in their home networks but I guess this might be the same). I guess it's not normal and correct, there should be +48... prefix.

The latter. Topping-up restores the full functionality (including the remaining credit). Now I realised that you can check if your iPlus is still valid. Just call its number from Russia. If you hear the message that number is unavaiable this will mean that it's still "alive". Since there's no VM, it won't cost you anything. I've just checked a Simplus which is in this one-year period and the VM answered.

Just curious. Until last summer the mobile numbering in Poland was moreless clear:
500,501,...,517 - Idea/Orange
60x,66x,69x (x-odd) - Plus/Simplus/iPlus
60x,66x,69x (x-even) - Era/TakTak
88x - "fake" MVNOs Heyah and Sami Swoi
Last year also 7xx mobile prefixes were enabled. So far I know:
788 - Heyah
783 - mBank mobile
781 - Plus.
790 - P4 (test phase).

As to Caller ID, you mean calling from iPlus to Russian SIMs roaming in Poland?
And the +48 prefix (Poland) was replaced with +7 prefix (Russia), right?
That's really strange. My experiences with SIMs roaming in Poland are restricted to UM only, but I can say that the Caller ID is the same as in the "hosting" network. I mean that I called from a Polish number to UM roaming on each of the three networks and I got the following results:
in Era: the number preceded with +48
in Orange: no prefix
in Plus: the number preceded with 0.

While you were in Poland, Plus was changing its Caller ID format by dropping the leading zero. However, I have no idea if it might have affect the country prefix (I guess it didn't).

Well, I've just tried it using Skype. It says something in Polish and then the following English phrase: "The subscriber can not be reached at this time, please, try again later.". So, you are right. It should be able to get back to life when it says "try again later", eventually. :)

I have a number starting with 6978..., so it seems to be a part of 'old' numeration.

No it was not replaced with the Russian prefix. The prefix was not existing. I just saw 6978... as CID. Since it was normal to call back being in Poland (local numeration), this would have inevitably resulted in some problems if it had been detected outside Poland this way or on a phone with a call-back roaming feature (such as Travelsim or other international cards that do not allow direct calling). Would it have been detected the same way on Russian phone located in Russia? I'm not sure, but what was the difference? I called phones that used Era or Orange, so Plus did not have any information that those phones were in Poland, so I'm afraid this shorten CID would have been sent to Russia and shown there (or may be with +7 added in Russia).

So, you mean before Plus was detected as 0697... and currently it's just 697...? This is what I meant above, correct CID is given only with Era. For example, here it's used to add +7.. in CID for calls made to ANY direction. This is in fact more useful even at home, it allows people to add numbers to their phonebooks right after detected in the international format (thus allowing to call them from anywhere in the world with no prefix mess) and so on.

Hmm, I think that each operator sends full CID (i.e. with +48) everywhere, but Orange and Plus just cut it before reaching the particular SIM (even a foreign one, roaming in Poland). I don't know the reason for using such a format. Anyway, CID format shouldn't affect outgoing calls in international SIMs since their callback features are based on USSD or SMS, not CID.

Of course, saving numbers from own country in the international format makes sense, in general. However, Plus and Orange use USSD in prepaid roaming (whereas Orange supports direct dialling in some networks, it's always even more expensive than using USSD) so the "full" numbers stored in the SIM/phone are useful just for SMS/MMS sending. But, as long as "native" SMSC is used, national prefix isn't really necessary for sending SMSes.

Oh, yes, this might be a reason. Anyway, parsing an incoming CID is a sort of unusual and strange thing for telephony, AFAIK, even though these operators should use direct channels to each other, so they always aware of where a call is originating from.

It should in some way. Look, I use Travelsim in Poland and get a call from Poland on it. I see a number without +48, right? Then I try to call it back (suppose I'm a normal user and do not know what +48 is) using USSD or their SIM menu or pseudo direct calling that in fact uses USSD and... the call will not be placed, right? The Estonian switch should be really intellectual to figure out that it's a call without prefix, so, well, it's going from Poland, so let's add +48 to the number and keep the call processing with +48 added. I bet it won't work. The similar thing does not work for Russia, for example (it says Wrong number when I try to call a Russian number without +7 from Russia).

You are right, it's not about SMS, it's mostly about 'normal' roaming. By the way, it's almost the only sort of roaming used on Russian SIMs (except of Tele2 Russia). Since Russian international dialing prefix is 810..., people keeping numbers in local format have no chances to call home from Europe (you must be a GSM addict to know that you should either add +7 or 007 to the number you are dialing and cut off 810 if it exists :) ).