Registering a Greek prepaid SIM
 

i went into a Germanos shop to register my 2 Cosmokarte SIMs. Very casual. Guy writes down the numbers on a piece of paper, takes the passport copy I brought with me, and that's it he said - wasn't asked to sign anything and no computer input.

Fine. Except that the next day I get a reminder SMS that by law I have to register this SIM. So did he do it, forget, or just chuck the paper in the bin?

Does anyone know a way of checking if a SIM is registered - via the Cosmote website for example? Maybe I'll just have to do it again.

Also went to a Wind shop to register my F2G SIM. They entered the details into their computer and printed lots of stuff for me to sign, as is usual in Greece. But I had to stop him automatically 'upgrading' my old F2G SIM to a 'new prepaid' one - which would have lost me the data offer mentioned here previously. Something to watch out for.

I got more SMSes from Cosmote warning me to register or get suspended so I went to an OTE shop this time and registered again. This time it was done on the computer with printouts to sign like with Wind. The guy wanted to see the SIMs - not just the cards they were originally attached to. And he also needed my father's Christian name.

On putting each SIM back in a phone I immediately got an SMS confirming it was registered successfully. (No such confimation from Wind: anybody know how to check if a Wind SIM is registered?)

I assume that the people in the original Germanos shop just didn't know what to do but wouldn't admit it. They assumed that they could do it later and then found that they couldn't.

I register a Cosmote card in Germanos and a Wind F2G card in a Wind store last December. In both cases, I had to sign two documents (the ones you mentioned in a previous post about Vodafone), and the whole procedure was done into their computer databases (i.e., they entered my details immediately on their databases, they didn't just took a photocopy of the documents).

But I'm reading reports that lately (and depending on the store or the employee) due to big increase of the registrations, some stores are just taking photocopies of the documents and they register your details later (later=1-2 weeks) when they have some free time. Even if this is quite "safe" procedure, personally I would demand for the registration and signing to be done on my presence and not later.

Regarding the confirmation, upon successful registration, Cosmote sent me an SMS but not Wind (even if they registered the card successfully). I read the same happens with other subscribers. Cosmote sends a confirmation SMS but Wind don't. To be on the safe side, I would suggest to call Wind CC to confirm the registration but only after a week or two.

I just noticed that you replied while I was writing my reply and I can't edit it anymore.

The people in the original Germanos shop, most probably knew what to do but I guess it's more important for them to sell contracts and phones than use their opening hours time for registration. I know it happens in many stores in all three providers.

I hope you won't be double registered because it's more than certain that they will enter your registration details later (I suppose it won't happen though, because they will see on their online system that this number is already registered).

Good catch! They try to "upgrade" most people to the "New Prepaid Card" which means that you will automatically lose the 1.5GB free data. To be on the safe side, you could call 1269 and listen the message till the end where it informs you about the prepaid tariff your card has.