Take care when purchasing from Ebay. A good many of the recharge vouchers for sale are collectors items where the credit has already been used. If you don't read French, look for the usual "Item specifics" where it will tell you either "Neuf: Objet neuf et intact, n'ayant jamais servi..." (new, has never been used) or "Objet ayant été utilisé" (has already been used).

There is no way to enter a recharge code on the Orange Portail. You must do it through the phone menu. The Portail will allow recharging via credit card, but only if it's a French card. I believe that even the credit cards of neighbouring countries will not work.

on orange.fr my sim now has"mes options" accees au mode international" "options mail" and options "internet max"
so ihope it will be working ind week 3:p

I have a HTC desire that i will use fr.
Do any off you have settings for Android and orange? can;t se to find it on orange fr!
Chr

Your desire should configure itself automatically after inserting the Orange SIM. For any case these are the settings:
APN: orange
user: orange
pass: orange

Not too difficult to remember!

Hello
used prepaid from ebay.fr(2004ibiza) and it worked very well! used about 300 mb in a week!
info:
1.speed test was approximately 0.5 mbit download and approximately 1.5 mb upload!
(perhaps because many are on?)
2.speed was ok on both mobile and with use off htc desire as hot spot to pc!
2. tried sim in usb modem and there was a warning not to use the sim on the PC!
4. bought 20 euros in the tobacco shop and they helped me with charge on phone menu 224 )
5.but it looks like it works with USSD from abroad (see picture) menu #123#
5.have now "Consult" Internet Max "and" mail option "and from menu and pre select it
6. hope to aktivate “internet max” and “mail option” next time for France with recharge from
ebay.fr from just buy new sim from our frind 2004ibiza?
chr

Orange email address to register ID
 

Hi
Going to Paris in a few weeks.
Ordered Mobicarte SIM :)
ref :
eBay - The UK's Online Marketplace

Vendor supplied email address rejected as invalid.:-(

Would someone post the french Orange email address to register my ID please.
I dont speak or read french.
Thank you

Gmail compose reported :

The address "blois.contrats@orange.com." in the "To" field was not recognized. Please make sure that all addresses are properly formed.

:???:

Get rid of the full stop (period) at the end of the address and you should find it will work.

Having said that, I'm surprised to hear that Orange France would accept a scan of a passport via email. If you do manage to successfully activate the SIM via email, please post back here and let us know.

The SIM cards from Ebay seller 2004ibiza are pre-activated and you do not have to do the activation yourself.

Glad to hear it worked for you. There is an Ebay seller who sells Orange recharges (also on ebay as emy351). elaine.mahy@gmail.com She will accept Paypal transfers. 10 euros per 6 months will keep the number active indefinitely although the credit will expire of course.

hi
emy351 is it on ebay.fr seller who sells Orange recharges is ?
chr

No, ebay UK.

Hi,
Purchased the Orange card on ebay with 15 euro credit. After setting up card but before receiving my mot de passé (took 24 hours as other members have indicated as usual), I received an email from Orange acknowledging my 15 euro "pass voyage d'orange" and asking me to "responded TA a ce SMS, besoin de + ou-de mn faites le 444 gratuit".
I SMS'd "TA" and then got a message " Orange info: pass internet international 25E=50Mo de connexions valuables 7 jours, souscription au 444 grauit"
Problem is, even though I am only 2 days into my 7 and have only used the card to SMS in search of my password and my data is off, I am told I have no credit. Can anyone tell me why and if it is possible to retrieve the credit?
Thanks

I think what has happened is that you have accepted one of Orange's sales SMS's offering to sell you some access (in this case their "International Internet Pass", 25 euros for 50MB over 7 days). As soon as you accepted this the relevant credit was deducted from your account. Don't ask me how they gave you a pass worth 25 euros when you only had a 15 euro balance. Maybe it's a welcome gift :).

Anyway, that's where the money has gone I would say. Be aware that you will quite often get SMSs from Orange offering you various plans and deals for calls, SMS and so on.

The plan you have bought is not good value for internet access (unless you plan to use it outside France). Within France, the Internet Max and Mail options are the only really good ones.

If you want to activate the Internet Max before you arrive in France, you will need to add some credit. You can't do this via the Portail Orange unless you have a French credit card. The easiest way to get a recharge is via ebay UK seller emy351. She is reputable but charges a premium over the face value of the recharge.

Thank you Scirocco, you were spot on with your diagnosis. Fortunately the solution didn't require me waiting until I went to France or a new recharge from the english ebay seller.
I spent quite some time tracking down an english speaking employee at Orange France but then they, after determining I had made a mistake cancelled my old contract and subscribed me to internet max all in a matter of seconds. Thanks again for your help!

I used a Mobicarte in France a couple of years ago, and I discovered that if you subscribe to a data option and you want to change to a different option, you first have to cancel the first option before you can add the new subscription. In my case, this meant a call to a non-English speaking service rep. It took some effort, but I was able to make it work.

The customer interactions, setup, etc., for Orange in France is pretty primitive. I had a much simpler time setting up an Orange subscription in Austria, where the guy at the store was knowledgeable and helpful.

No number.....?
 

Just got a 25 eu pre-paid sim from ebay.fr from the guy previously mentioned. I was advised to place the sim in my phone and call another phone to get the number which I need to setup an account on the orange portal in France.

I am still in the UK at the moment. So.....when I try and ring another phone to get my number, nothing happens, it dials then drops the call, no tone, nothing. I have a good signal, so it's not that. On the piece of paper sent to me, it says pin:0000, but my phone doesn't ask for any pin. My phone is the xperia X10 mini pro running android.

I've been through my settings menu to see if it lists my number but it says 'nothing'.

Any ideas where I go from here....I need my number!

Thanks

hi are you calling the right number? If you are calling from orange sim
and a in the United Kingdom, just call your own phone number(from orange sim) with no extra ciffers. The orange sim know it is in uk:cool:
chr

THanks for your reply.

I tried calling another mobile number using the orange sim to see if I could find out what my orange number is, but the phone won't connect, the call just drops.

There must be another way to find out what my orange number is?

can you please send a link of this item on ebay.fr ?

The seller should provide you the number written down. When I bought my SIM I got the number written on a piece of paper like I posted back in post 72 in this thread. Did you get anything like that?

I think poster flychr got his number sent by separate post to the SIM. Maybe it will come in a day or two.

Edit: Failing that, if the call is dropping out, perhaps try a different carrier - maybe manually set the carrier in the phone menu. Have you got good reception? What network has the phone connected to? How many bars signal? Or try sending a text to another phone instead of a call.

Or try dialling 225 to get a text with your phone number and remaining credit.

does anyone has a link for buying this activated orange sim card?

Search on Ebay France for "orange prepaid 15". The seller ibiza2004 has nearly 2700 feedback.

On my Mobicarte (when used outside France) I can get the number as follows:

Dial #123#
Reply with 3 for "suivi conso"
This should bring up some text and among it all will be a number like 06 xx xx xx xx. This is the phone number excluding the 33 for France.

how does this guy register and activate the number under buyer's name? via scanned passport? i thought in France this could be done only by visiting in person a orange shop.

I think he is an Orange reseller. There is probably a tick box that they have to set when doing the activation confirming that they have seen high quality ID e.g. a passport or bank account/credit card. Your Paypal transaction provides this.

hi
No , i tekst my self to get the phone nr! there is no sim code.
Are you sure the phone with the orange sim is not sim locked?
chr

new price: Eur 9,95 including 5 euros of credit
 

Hi,
Yesterday I went to Lille from the Netherlands and bought a new 3G Mobicarte in an Orange shop, because I forgot to recharge my old card that was 2 years old.

The new Mobicarte now costs only €9,95 in an Orange shop. It can be used for making phonecalls immediately.

There is only one thing: after having shown the passport in the shop, the Orange computers need to activate the internet usage, so this can take up to 48 hours. In my case it only took 15 hours. As I said, one can make phonecalls when leaving the store but not use the internet.

This morning I could activate my Internet max because my phonenumber had been activated. So if I were in France now, I would be able to use the internet.

The phonenumber can be used for 6 months, the minimum recharge for another 6 month now is €10. If you only recharge with 5 euros, you will lose the number.

Since I only need internet during weekends, I always buy €5 recharges and immediately activate the internet max for a weekend.

From now on I will have to buy €10 recharges.

No joy
 

Thanks for that. Didn't work though, just got some text back saying I had 3.32 euro and 33 sms left, but no number.

I contacted ibiza2004 via ebay, a couple of days ago to ask how I can get my number, I am still waiting for a reply, the standard reply of 'call another phone' doesn't really cut it.

update
 

Thought I would try a different tactic.....send an sms to another phone!

Ok, that worked and a number appeared...was it mine or just a random number thrown out by orange's sms servers? It did begin with +33 though....so, I called this +3368958xxxx number to see if my mobile rang...it didn't. The tone I got was the tone you hear when a phone number does not exist. I also sent an sms back to the french sim phone...it didn't receive it.

Looking through the phone settings its roaming, in service and on the orange network and I have a strong signal, however, it says its mobile network state is 'disconnected'.

The puzzle deepens. :confused:

It seems very odd if you could send an SMS from an unregistered phone. I'm wondering if you're having some problem with your APN setup on the phone that keeps you from getting the correct network connection.

hi
no must be the right nr!
try to get the password for log on to orange ! but perhaps there is no credit on sim?
chr

I am in same boat as randomelemental, except I do at least have my phone number. I turned off all cell data, inserted the SIM, and activated it with no problems. Once I got a signal (via T-Mobile) the French number appeared in my phone. (It's an iPhone 4S with the GSM Sim Unlocked for Foreign Carriers).

My problem is that I only have an available balance of 3.31 EUR, but I purchased the SIM + 25.00 EUR credit. I have managed to get my password and set up an account online with Orange : téléphones, forfaits, Internet, actualité, sport, video, and as near as I can tell, the only activity on the account was two charges on 07/03/2012 at 14:39...one is for an outgoing call for 0.220 EUR and one for "communication" for 1.472 EUR. That tells me that the original credit on the SIM was only 5.00 EUR. I'm assuming that this was part of the activation/registration process, but if the SIM had 25.00 EUR on it, then the remaining balance should be 23.31, non?

I've also contacted the ebay seller ibiza2004 and am waiting on a response, but that was two days ago. I just wonder if I'm overlooking something obvious. There was no scratch off card included with the sim. Also, while I have been able to access the #123# menu and can dial 224 (for which my French is way to insufficient), I am unable to dial 225 with any success.

Any suggestions, hints or solutions (beyond escalating to ebay complaints?)

I'm attaching a screenshot of my account activity (I hope...)
Attachment 84

Hi All

I have a French mobicarte ordered and activated via their website (photocopy of ID sent with cheque to orange). The sim should come with 5 euro standard, am I right in saying I can just add 5 euro credit then get Orange Max.

Or can I not use the 5 euros already on the card for Orange Max? (Also will this 5+5 count as the 10 euros required to keep the sim active?)

Why not? When I purchased an Orange mobicarte the last time in 2008 it worked like this.

For the first question, yes. You can use the pre-loaded credit to activate Max. Second question, I believe that it will not keep it activated more then one month.

Thanks, I am actually in France now with an activated French sim.

(Though not using the actual card)...oddly my HTC won't connect to the sim and shows no signal? (Unlocked and roaming set to on), however plugging it into a relatives French phone means it picks up the signal straight away.

Any clues?

Now plugged into my dongle and it is picking up a signal but the orange/orange/orange doesn't appear to be working. It tries to connect but times out (definitely should be able to connect though)

http://img404.imageshack.us/img404/2302/configi.jpg

What am I doing wrong?

Try "orange.fr" as APN despite just "orange" should work, too. Maybe Orange in the meantime refuse connections from non-handsets by IMEI (serial number) as the "Orange Max" data option is limited to handset use by their terms and conditions.

EDIT: Have you actually placed a phone call with your SIM card? I remember that you had to place a call in order the SIM got get fully activated. Just try calling some toll-free French number.

Worked out what it was, just needed the dial number of *99# added and it connects but obviously pops up with the message saying computers are barred. However at least I know it works and just need to sort my HTC issue out!

If you're lucky they still distingusih between handsets and non-handsets only by the "user agent", by which every browser identifies itself upon each http-request, and not by IMEI. In that case the following "hack" should still work:
Use Firefox, install the "User Agent Switcher" addon and change the "user agent" from the menu to one from a mobile device (such as the iPhone which is preconfigured in the "User Agent Switcher").

hi
can you confirm that orange mobilcarte vill work in usb modem?
i got but maybe I am wrong?
chr

Officially it won't. The question is how Orange technically prevent users to use the SIM in a non-handset. If they do it only by inspecting the user agent of http requests, then the above described workaround should let you use the SIM in a non-handset (with the side effect of some websites automatically showing their mobile version instead of the desktop one). If they however check the device's IMEI you will either need to manipulate the IMEI or use Wifi-tethering through a handset in addition to the user-agent manipulation.

Btw the last time I used a Mobicarte in France almost two years ago they were billing all traffic not using the standard http-ports (80, 8080) separately. So using an email client, instant messaging clients, ftp clients etc resulted in prohibitively high extra charges.

Let's hope France's latest market entrant Free will soon launch a prepaid product with affordable data rates available to visitors.