I would like a Global Sim card but with a UK number - not Lichtenstein. Can you advise me of the best place to get one? United Mobile have fabulous rates but they use Lichtenstein numbers.
Reason for the UK number - it is cheaper for my friends & family in the USA to call me on a UK cell phone than a Lichtenstein cell phone number.

You can order one from 0044 Ltd - that will give you a UK number
More specifically an Isle of Man number. Yes it is part of the UK but
most of the UK mobile operators charge it as an international destination.

At the moment I guess USA carriers still bundle the IoM number
at the same rate as UK mobiles - but this could change in the same
way as Lichtenstein mobile numbers used to be be cheap - and then overnight the cost to (reliably) call them from the UK went from 8p (UKP 0.08) to 32p (UKP 0.32).

The only problem I have found with 0044 is that they seem to have the habit of
changing rates for outgoing calls. The charges part of the website changed a few days ago and several rates have gone up a lot eg calling a UK landline from UK was 9p now 28p. There seems to be some confusion as to whether this is to new customers or all customers. There was also promise of being able to get account details - balance etc online or by text msg but that hasn't happened.

I would use mine a lot more for outgoing if at the very least I could get a balance automatically rather than having to ring customer services - and the rates were more obvious

Oh and the other one which might be a show stopper is the minimum topup is UKP 28.69 (ouch) - not far off the cost of a new card.

Having said that their customer services is good. If you email them you usually get a reply back quickly even today 1 May which is a public holiday!


There are of course other providers offering +44 762 numbers but I've not used them so cannot comment.


Hope that helps

Ian

Ther are a quite of a few 0044 cards around, just take your pick. Check out this link http://www.prepaidgsm.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=957 I have personally bought from Geodesa. http://www.globalsimcard.co.uk/ The reason for this was that I can directly deal with owner of the company, so no excuses on seller side that someone didn't hand him my message if something goes wrong etc.

I was just looking at Geodesa and noticed that it listed Thuraya as a free incoming carrier. Has anyone tested this. It would be very interesting if true.

Sorry, but may I correct a few items please?

UK mobile networks do not all count IoM as an international destination.

It is still possible to call Liechtenstein mobiles from UK for rather less than 32p, though the 4p and 7p routes no longer work; 10p is possible from landlines and 17p or 20p from O2 and Orange. I haven't checked what BT's rate is now, but it was 19p or so [their mistake].

Account detail information, including tariffs and billing, is available online by logging in to the account, almost as in accordance with the instructions supplied with the SIM, but now via www.callkey.com rather than the callkeyone domain.

A text message is received after every call, giving cost of that call and remaining balance. If that doesn't satisfy you, then call 187 and you get a text reply of the balance, free of charge.

And 0044 have clarified that unless CallKey give notice of it, rates will remain the same on the older SIMs.
_

It is possible to use the account with other mobiles, and landlines, but only webform trigger or sms callback to the mobile sending. It could do with a wap version to set up landlines.

Like all the other global SIMs, it's possible to use a separate callback service for cheaper calls. Try Voipfone, for 9.5p = 17c, as ticex and I discussed at some length on another thread.

Depending on the OP's rate for UK mobiles, Voipfone also may be worth looking at, forwarding to it for 15c per minute. Get a free US number from IPkall or FreeDigits, and point this at the SIP address - so I'm told; I haven't tested it yet. Maybe this is better for calls/diversion from US mobiles than landlines, as you'd still have long distance charges from landline to Washington State or Idaho, though you can rent another area code from FreeDigits.

I would check the policy of all the CallKey dealers on future charges, but it would appear to me that 0044's now fewer countries with free incoming calls would take people towards other suppliers if they do not also do this.

Actually it's not completely true that calls from USA to Liechtenstein mobiles are more expensive than calls to UK mobiles...

Example AT&T ld, if that's your ld carrier, has an international calling plan for $1/month (don't know if you can go in and out) that only charges 11?/minute to Liechtenstein mobiles against 30?/minute to UK mobiles.

And callbackworld 800 pin2dest costs only 14?/minute to Liechtestein mobiles vs. something in the vicinity of 40?/minute to UK mobiles.

Well spotted.

There might be handset compatibility issues for outgoing calls, but if it doesn't work then use separate callback, as it receives calls in unlisted phones (like Nokia 3210 and 3510i) - in satellite-only areas this separate method would need a callback triggered by sms (29c), as caller ID is off for now and no data

I wonder where I could borrow or single day hire a phone ...

edit - I've just found one dealer that sells the phones with Thuraya SIM, or O2 or Vodafone postpaid deals. The latter tarifffs are ok for GSM roaming, but rather higher for satellite use, so I suspect the same arrangement may be true of other networks partnered with Thuraya

I've also noticed that, but since I couldn't even find a full tariff calculator or table on the Geodesa site, I didn't considered this Thuraya roaming seriously :)

What tariffs do you mean?

The O2 one has ?17 a month, 12p a minute GSM, ?1.70 outgoing sat, ?1.41 incoming sat. Vodafone one is around ?1 a minute

- not very interesting really

Andy: I can rent here Thuraya handset from Eurotel for Euro 14 for 3 days plus deposit Euro 470. You should ask your oprataor for rental. :construction:

10 minutes would be long enough

GT-sim is another with an Isle of Man number. I like the fact it is postpaid (and SMS is currently free), but it's only free incoming in one country which would limit it for some people.

Cheapest way to call an IoM mobile via a US number: set up a skype-in number in the US, and call-forward it to the IoM number. Currently charged at the Skype world rate (2.1c/min). Disadvantages: that's a billing error, so won't last, the forwarding is slow (many rings), the quality is often poor and there is a $3/mo fee for the Skype in number.

Next alternatve: ipkall.com or freedigits.com US number (both free), forwarded to the SIP address of a free account at voipfone.co.uk (I use this a lot, works well). Forward the voipfone.co.uk number to the IoM mobile for 8.4p(15c)/min, prepaid in 5 pound chunks, no monthly fees. I don't think any other VOIP companies offer anything below 15c/min for UK mobiles, and most have monthly fees.

So, this gives a US number to call, and costs you 15c/min to receive calls in the countries that an IoM roaming mobile is free to receive in. It's worth getting a US number, as the cost of calling a UK mobile from a normal US carrier, can be very expensive on basic plans (e.g. $1.46/min on Qwest).

Yes, and that country can't be the US or Canada. Or at least so they told me.

And India.... AFAIK they just cancel 38 eurocents/min "base rate" for incoming calls but the 60 eurocents/min (USA & Canada) or 1 euro/min (India) surcharge remains :(.

I had a chat with a satellite phone dealer. They don't do hire themselves, but could suggest someone else that charges $300 a month.

I asked about roaming it with other SIMs, and he said this would only be in GSM mode, that satellite coverage specifically needs a Thuraya SIM. I mentioned these global roaming SIMs, and he sounded sort of interested, but not enough to suggest I come and try it when I fished for the idea; it might clash with their commission arrangements anyway I suppose

We need someone to borrow one, but I suspect we'll find that if it did work, the satellite roaming charges will somehow be fed back from Thuraya

I am in contact with local Thuraya dealer. He will let me try my SIM card in his hand set. I should test it no later than by Friday So I will let you know than. It will be free of charge for me :thumbup: . On the side of the information to Andy, I don't agree with the his local satellite dealer. Here in Czech Republic, I can use either Eurotel or T-Mobile Czech Republic SIM on Thuraya in Satellite mode, here is the link for Eurotel charges http://www.eurotel.cz/jnp/en/roaming/opera...orId=327&page=1 and T-Mobile version is in Czech only and they are slightly cheaper that Eurotel. So I wouldn't give the link for this one. :sad:

So this morning I tested a bit my Geodesa Card with Thuraya handset. Sorry I didn't have too much time today, but results are more than promising. First of all, the handset was switched to satellite only mode.So I typed in my PIN code and went outside to catch some sunshine and Thuraya signal as well. Well, it went this way. At beginning I got on handset display sign "Searching Network" and indicator of the signal started to register some signal "out of space". At this time the guy from Thuraya dealership said, card have definitely trying to register with network. On my question how long this can take, he replied about minute or so. After a few moments card had registered with Thuraya network, on the display was written" Thuraya-Czech Republic". So I tried to call my 00447624+ number from my Vodafone CZ phone. It took at least 10 rings on Vodafone CZ before Thuraya handset started to ring as well. I was already thinking that this will ring forever and then will drop in to voicemail like in time when that card is not handset. So we have talked with Thuraya dealer guy for about 15 second. The quality wasn't best, but you could hear him well and clearly. The same he said about his side. I didn't checked for SMS. Outgoing calls didn't worked. Now the best part of it. I asked him if I can check on internet, how much the incoming call have did cost. He was also curious, so he let me type in my entry codes, to see the cost. The cost for the incoming call was USD 0.00. Only change I have realised was that instead of quoting name of country in column "To" with the web-based account info system, there is written "Delivery to handset". :detective2:

Now that is truly interesting. CZ -> UK -> UAE -> Space -> CZ for $0.00 :D

It sounds promising. I expect it's unlikely you'd be able make outgoing calls for handset compatability reasons, so would use a separate callback service, which would need to be sms triggered as no caller ID or data possibilities

Only thing I am afraid now is, that if more people will use this option. Callkey will close free incoming calls on Thuraya Satellite, using SIM cards sourced from CallKey . :sad:

BTW Handset was Hughes. Sorry.

yes - only to be used in satellite only areas, to stay in stealth mode

one thing puzzles me slightly - although switched to satellite only mode, it's picked up its location, so has searched all networks

Location of the handset is determined with either GPS (built into the handset) in Thuraya and Globalstar's case or triangulation (they use satellite arrays) in Iridium's case.

In either case there is no need to talk to ground level networks to correctly identify location.

thanks - proves my brain is slow - I read the other day it includes GPS, and had forgotten

The dealer said that all handsets have build-in GPS. So perhaps it does send signal to Thuraya about that handset location. So they can calculate in which country you are located. As they also charge according to, where from you are calling( I mean with regular Thuraya SIM cards).

Well, well just have to keep it a secret. ;)