Hello,
from September 1st Blauworld (www.blauworld.de, using e-plus infrastructure) lowered its prices and added more countries for cheap calls. Germany is 29ct all time all destinations, international calls as followed:


Afghanistan Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,39
Afghanistan Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,39
Albanien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,21
Albanien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Belarus (Wei?russland) Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Belarus (Wei?russland) Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Belgien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Belgien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Bosnien-Herzegowina Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,25
Bosnien-Herzegowina Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,35
China Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
China Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Estland Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Estland Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,35
Frankreich Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Frankreich Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Griechenland Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Griechenland Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Gro?britannien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Gro?britannien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Hong Kong Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Hong Kong Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Indien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,19
Indien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,19
Indonesien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,19
Indonesien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,19
Irak Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,19
Irak Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,35
Iran Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,19
Iran Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,25
Irland Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Irland Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Italien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Italien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Japan Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Japan Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,21
Kanada Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Kanada Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Kasachstan Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,21
Kasachstan Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,25
Kosovo Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Kosovo Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Kroatien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
Kroatien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Lettland Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
Lettland Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Libanon Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,21
Libanon Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,35
Litauen Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
Litauen Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,25
Luxemburg Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Luxemburg Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Marokko Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,25
Marokko Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,35
Mazedonien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,19
Mazedonien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,35
Niederlande Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Niederlande Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
?sterreich Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
?sterreich Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Pakistan Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,25
Pakistan Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,25
Polen Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Polen Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Portugal Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Portugal Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Rum?nien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
Rum?nien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,35
Russland Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Russland Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Schweiz Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Schweiz Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Serbien-Montenegro Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
Serbien Montenegro Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Spanien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Spanien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Thailand Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
Thailand Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
Tschechien Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Tschechien Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
T?rkei Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
T?rkei Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,19
Ukraine Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,15
Ukraine Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,25
Ungarn Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Ungarn Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
USA Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
USA Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,09
Vietnam Festnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29
Vietnam Mobilnetz 0-24 Uhr pro Minute 0,29

Wow, great tariffs, I think next time I'm in Germany I could get one to call home at 9cent/min! :)

And call Germany via a calling card's foreign access number ...

What exactly is this; Calling card or sim;

Its a SIM-card. Same platform like Simyo or Blau or the other e-plus brands.
It cost 20 Euro with 10 Euro starting balance.
To be ordered online (requires a german postal adress though).

Chris

A calling card FROM A LANDLINE can beat those rates, however.

As i understand it, the card is MAINLY meant (targeted at) for foreigners living in Germany to call their home countries or possibly to be called. I guess the company figures the target audience might not have a landline OR might need to call at any moment.

Stan

Of course, but also someone going to Germany quite often (for tourism, business or for chasing blond girls! :D) could find this offer very interesting.

It's about time! I was about to order one, but I'll wait a while to see if anyone finally tries to compete with these rates. Note that there's still a 15 cent connection charge.

More good news: Beginning in October, Simyo-to-Simyo will cost 6 cents per minute.

The W European countries and US were just added, I believe. True about tourists, etc. HOWEVER, that still leaves open whether your friends in Italy will be willing to call your German SIM or what it cost you to forward calls to the German SIM.

OT: why is the latest info on the NEWSBLOG still about Virgin going to France -- from Spring?

And blau.de, too, no?

So when will T-MO follow suit? How can Penny do it?

Yes, exactly.
But especially the target group usually does not have a landline connection themselves. And calling cards from the public phone are more expensive and less conveniant than such a card.

I was surprised that they added Europe and USA to these prices. I'm sure some business-contract users are quite pissed to see that the prepaid-card beats their tariff by 75% or so :unsure:

Chris

Whatever the target group, it's about time someone had calls outside Germany that reflected reality. The 2 euro per minute rate hadn't changed since prepaid was introduced 10 years ago, back when Deutsche Telekom was your only money-grubbing alternative and a landline call to the US cost 23 pfennig (12 cents) for every 5.6 seconds.

It's just a shame I now have to carry around yet another phone, or at least SIM, and that the likes of simyo couldn't have done this earlier.

If anyone else is planning on getting blauworld, give me your e-mail address and I'll recommend you. :beer: I get 5 euros! Dunno what you get, though... :blink:

oh bad, I didn't notice it, that changes the situation a bit, but anyway it's still a convenient offer.

That's great! :) I wonder why SIMyo doesn't offer cheap international calls as well...

when I'm abroad no one calls me... except maybe AndreA, but he calls at any number! :D
I use it as a tourist, I never used any forwarding service, in Italy they are not popular at all, and by now I never needed any

lazyness :( My fault, I shold put news there, maybe I could "open" it to some forumers which often have news in order to keep it more updated.

Somehow OT. Sometimes I think that our US friends are a little bit "crazy" (no offence, just my impession :D) about forwarding incoming calls from home-country numbers to foreign SIMs. I realise that sometimes such a solution is justified and necessary, but my general opinion about the "problem" is the following: if I'm abroad, my compatriots should call me at a foreign number :D. In fact, besides possible costs for for the calling party, what is the problem to say "when I'm in Germany, call my mobile phone # +49...(or +423, +354, +447624, +372)" or "when I'm in Germany, call my hotel +49... room #1313" (as it used to be obvious in pre-mobile times)???

It's a whole lot easier for people to reach you, if you can give them a local number(a number with a US area code) they are familiar with rather than an international one. See, a lot of people in the US have never (and probably will never have a needd to) dial an international number. So, they tend to get confused and not dial it correctly when they have to dial an international number. For me I just want my family to be able to reach me easily. As for friends, I just give them the international number.

This is probably (at least it was for me) why most of us found Yackie to be very attractive, because it's the only international sim that provided a local US number. Yackie has not yet come through, so I have resorted to using Voicestick forwarded to my GlobalSim for an upcoming trip.

Europe and USA are very different sometimes, and talking about telephony I think we are again in 2 different worlds. I live the same situation of my Polish friend, but I understand the reasons of the American guys.
Here it would be no sense to give a local number since we all use mobiles. And on Italian mobiles you cannot divert to a foreign number (and if you could you'd spend tons of euros). Also Italians are not used to diverted calls, most people hang down before even hearing any sound. So better use a foreign card, if I need I call, if someone needs me, they'll call! :D

Yeah, same for germans.
If there is no ringing sound after 1 second they think it doesnt work and hang up. Sometimes tricky for my o2 genion which has a landline number as well and sometimes needs a few seconds before it realizes that it has to ring ;-)

Chris

The O2 Home Zone (originally a Viag Interkom innovation) is quite an interesting concept. I'm surprised that none of the US GSM providers have picked up on the idea. Furthermore, I can see the moment coming where at least one other network will try to compete with BASE's flatrate offer. I use it myself and it's very practical to have at one's disposal.

I have READ something about T-MO experimenting with this concept in test markets. I think it is hush-hush. Perhaps others in US or elsewhere know more.

Yes, this would be a rare advantage of the otherwise poorly planned North American system where mobile phones have telephone numbers indistinguishable from those of landlines. Genion is indeed pretty neat, although it took some time for the other companies to offer a similar service.

OK, I can understand your point to some extents. AFASIR, I called abroad for the first time when I was about 30 (a few years after I sent a first e-mail abroad :)) - because I didn't need it to do it before (and because it was very expensive due to the monopoly of Polish Telecom).

It's their problem :P , Personally even when I didn't need to call abroad, I perfectly knew how to perform this "complicated" task.

I agree with you that the idea of Yackie numbering is potentially very attractive (to some extent also for European users, too since they offer also European landline numbers). However, Yackie Israeli number can't be used for voice calls - no choice for CPP. I think that solution offered by RangeRoamer i.e. both "native" international SIM number (Estonian one - it's Travelsim) and a US number with forwarding (toll free in this case) is something satifying both CPP and CSP users...

http://www.rangeroamer.com/how-it-wo...ople-call.aspx

Me, too :).
But it sounds really strange to me to forward calls to blauworld or any other foreign SIM. The European approach is rather to inform about a foreign #, enjoy free incoming calls and, in such cases like blauworld also to enjoy cheap calls home. Some people also leave a voice info on their VM's "my new number is ... don't leave a message, please call me ".

In Poland international diverting is not possible either. Moreover, in many case it would cost the same or even more than incoming calls in roaming :P.
However, Effendi please note that the Europeans often divert calls but to their VM's :)

I've seen friends just bear the roaming costs, and others seem to switch to mainly text messages. In a group, we've managed to get all the same local SIMs a few times now, and then some still use two phones, or some have people at home use cheap calls providers to reach them.

Call diversion is possible from O2 UK postpaid, at 17p to Europe, but it seems to be the only one.

Not very bad, especially if "Europe" includes FL, Iceland and Estonia :).
And how about diversion to IoM? It's "almost UK" so how operators consider it - as national or international?

Moreover, I think that international call diverting should be available in prepaid rather than in postpaid. It's just like incoming calls in roaming - a potential source of a very high bill and prepaid allows to control it somehow :whistle:

In the meanwhile here is another "copy" of Blauworld:
http://www.phonehouse.de/international

Ask O2 CS and after a long delay they may say it costs 14p/min (same as Ireland). But in fact it comes from the inclusive minutes. If they are exceeded, it seems to be 10p peak, 5p off-peak, which is the same as a landline. If they altered this I would use diversion via Voipfone for 8.4p a minute, or Skype ... or via an easyMobile Sim with loads of promotional free credit

Attention, this "copy" of blauworld still has the old blauworld rates (e.g. 99ct for western europa and USA)...

Chris

Another good thing about Blauworld: My SIM is valid for 12 months, not 6 as the website says.

...and another SIM with cheaper international calls started today.
Looks like another copy of blauworld though.

See all details here http://www.ortelmobile.de/

Chris

But it has a 7c? setup-fee while Blauworld has 15c?.

Germans have already complained that you cannot seem to order one via the net and there is no local outlet in Germany from which you can purchase these as yet. Bottom line: a bit premature to annouce the product without establishing distribution channels. As of this morning, anyway.

Stan

Ortel's website says 15 cents, same as Blauworld. It's a clone, all right. (And, I would hope, if one of them is going to drop the connection fee to 7 cents, they all will.)

BTW, I have seen another BW clone for sale at a telephone/internet center in Frankfurt (Oder), though the name of it escapes me. The prices advertised were the old ones, or it didn't mention most of Europe, USA, etc., presumably because it was 99 cents at the time of printing.

They need to edit their website a bit

- Einwahlgeb?hr ? 0,15 pro Gespr?ch
- The initial rate is ? 0.07 per call
- Le tarif initial est de 0,07 euro par appel.
- La tarifa inicial es 0,07 ? por llamada
- Her arama i?in başlangı? ?creti 0.07 Euro?dur
- Базовый тариф - 15 евроцентов за вызов


Germans and Russians might complain

Yes, it's 15 for Germans and Russians only! :P

Voipfone have just put their rates to mobiles up so it is now about 14p/min
(and calls to 3, 24p!!)

Thanks; it's already discussed on another thread. Apologies that we were off-topic above, though the other options are still there.

The company runs such a service in other countries as well. I think they ported the website and did not replace all parts yet ;)

lowered prices again
 

Blauworld will lower the prices from Feb 2007 again.

Calls inside germany go down from 25 to 19ct

Calls to many countries get lowered as well

Examples:
poland landlines 5ct
russia landline + mobile 8ct
ukraine landline 9ct, mobile 19ct
turkey landline 7,9ct
china landline+mobile 5ct
etc...

Chris

This is great news, although I can't tell whether calls to countries like the UK or US are going to be reduced as well - this could either mean they will not be, or simply that German journalists assume that Turkey, Poland, and the Balkans are the only places of interest to Blauworld customers. Either way, 5cents a minute to Poland is pretty neat - the cheapest call-by-call providers in Germany usually charge about 1.4 cents, so this is an excellent rate for a mobile.

Aha, it's eight countries plus Germany.

http://www.xdial.de/arch/2007/kw03/s24545.html