According to reports, Virgin Mobile and Carphone Warehouse have joined forces to launch a virtual mobile service in France which will be announced on Tuesday...any ideas of tariffs and whether virgin will not have that lose your credit after 10 days or 2 months or whatever garbage Orange, SFR and the other one have.

This is news to me too. But I know one thing: Virgin Mobile will always be competitive in any market they step into.

Any idea as to what network they'll be using for their MVNO?

Orange FR

Google results show that it was first announced as a possibility the end of October last year, but I didn't find anything up to date

... except a watch-this-space - http://www.virginmobile.fr/

and it says Monday

I happen to use yahoo for my searches...nothing against google mind you...at the top if you click on news and do a search virgin mobile france you get several news articles from the last couple of days indicating the eu regulatory body had given permission for the link up between CPW (Phone House in France) and VM and as noted the formal announcement on the virgin mobile Fr web site says announcement coming Monday.

They will launch their service tomorrow.

Prepaid :
http://www.virginmobile.fr/lv_cartes_prepayes.php

Prepaid fee :
sim card : 15? (with 5? inclued)
Top-up validity : 3month call + 6 month incoming only
Top-up : 10? minimum, you can top-up on internet

National sms : 10 cents
National call : 0.42?/min (second from the first second)
National GPRS/EDGE : 6cents/10KB

If you choose the 30Days validity when you top-up (instead of the default 3month)
you get lower fee (0.38?/min for 15?, 0,27 for 20?)

International call from france (60/1)
Call to zone1 (western europe) :
0.7?/min
Call to zone2 (eastern europe, maghreb, north america) :
0.8?/min
Call to zone3 & specific destinations :
1,55?/min
I suggest you to use a callback service like gsm2world.

SMS to international : 0.15?

Everything :
http://www.virginmobile.fr/download/fiche_..._2006-03-15.pdf
If you don't understand something ask me.

List of virgin megastore (i don't know if they will sell sim card there, but i think so) :
http://www.virginmegastore.fr/default2.asp.../f02_france.asp

1. Do you lose your credit after 3 months or can it be resurected...Virgin Mobile UK has a 180 day rule but they also say while you won't get back the same number necessarily your credit is not lost (at least I think that is the policy)

2. Correct me if I'm wrong...it seems that when you re-charge you get the choice between 30 days validity and 3 months validity for outgoing calls...and to encourage you to recharge for the shorter period, calls are cheaper. Does it say how you designate on a recharge which one you are doing?

3. Will they take credit cards issued outside of France to recharge on the net?

4. Finally, will they allow you to set up voice menus in English...for a while Orange FR did but apparently bowing to French sensibilities they dropped that option (I wonder if SFR does; after all it is really Vodafone FR)....

I suppose these answers are not on their web site but I suppose I can e mail them for answers to the questions.

1. credit is lost after 30day/3month (unless you recharge before).

2. You proably have to change your plan on a (voice or USSD) menu if you want the 30 Day option.

4. I don't know, but probably not, like about all others.
BTW, they will launch their service tomorrow. So they need a basic service working first.

Also, it's the same telecom company of http://www.breizhmobile.com/
a MNVO in Bretagne, but working everywhere in France (i have a sim card from them).
But with different offer.

I just called them (0800 00 1234 from france, it's a toll free you can probably call this number from outside).

For 3. : they told me yes.
For 4 : they don't know yet, it's a new service so they will call me back tomorrow.

If you have any other question, i will ask them tomorrow.

Merci beaucoup.

First confirmation : they will sell sim in Virgin megastore

Today, on the champs-elys?es store : :D

http://www.pdafrance.com/img/pdanews...P1046small.jpg

http://www.pdafrance.com/img/pdanews...P1050small.jpg

Wow this is great. Obviously, VM hasn't finished expanding just yet. I don't think we'll see them here in Germany just yet unless they end up signing on as an MVNO with one of the 4 German networks.

They could try a bit harder than this, surely?

No wonder they were so keen to get into the market there

Per minute rates in France are still incredibly high... at that price in Italy we can almost do a videocall with 3G networks, but voice calls billed per second are around 25 cent/min.

Surprised Virgin Mobile FR did not go the direction they did in the UK and the US (don't know what they did in Canada and Australia) i.e. 0,42?/minute for the first 5 minutes of use each day and then, I don't know let's pick a figure, 0,14?/minute for the rest of the day. That would have shown them.

Incidentally, on the down side here, if my French is correct, you will be charged for calls to voicemail the regular per call charge whereas one of their talking points in the UK is free voice mail.

Oh well, can't have everything.

In France most people use postpaid.
Prepaid is usually more expensive and you don't get a great phone for near free on subscription.

But if you choose to top-up often you get better prices.
For instance with virgin if you top-up 20?/month you pay 0.27?/min.
If you choose postpaid you get the same rate + unlimited sms.

With Bouygues telecom prepaid, if you top-up with the highest recharge (75?)
with 2 times less validity (3month. so that's 25?/month). you will pay 17 cents/min.

French prepaid rates are more likely based on the abount yoou choose to recharge/month.
If you choose the minimum, rates are higher.


For instance with NRJ mobile, they don't have ending validity.
But their rates is 0.55?/min !
But if you pay 25? once for 6 month, you will cut the price in half (that's still high price i think however, but more affordable)

Call to voicemail is free in france, with all operator.


About virgin, they called me :

The phone menu can be in english, but the voice menu will still remain in French.
The 5? inclued with the sim is valid 1month.
There is free delivery, and you can it can be aboard.

One other quicky...and in reading the brochure and relying on my High School French which I studied many a moon ago, it seems that Virgin Mobile FR will be charging for voice mail....I know the other French carriers don't....you've done a lot of great work and I appreciate it.....at your leisure if you could check this out, it would be most appreciated.

Thank you so much.

Check voicemail is free, even if you don't have credit anymore.

Free only from France of course.

Since VM is launching France, it looks like they will be letting go of their network in the UK:

http://www.rcrnews.com/news.cms?newsId=26023