Report on Europe Trip
 

My annual June trip to Europe is complete and I'm back home in the USA. Some interesting thoughts...

1. I wound up relying exclusively on vodafone's roaming summer bargain....it worked well. Whether I can count on it again in the future is problematic. I do wonder how they're doing and whether they're doing well enough to extend it indefinitely. Haven't heard anything one way or the other.

2. Now here's the interesting part. As I left the Gatwick Express at Victoria, there was a stand set up giving away free Lebara sim cards, no hassle or anything but they did require a £5 top up. Same thing happend when I got off Eurostar at St. Pancreas on my return from Paris....there were a couple of people giving away free Lebara sim cards. Easiest thing in the world.

3. Yesterday (Tuesday 30/06), I was walking down Oxford Street and as I passed the T Mobile store, there was somebody outside handing out free sim cards (no top up necessary). Of course as we have noted, T Mobile's biggest advantage is the ability to use Your Call World to make cheap international card.

It was also rumoured in the papers that Vodafone is negotiating to buy out T Mobile UK.

Thanks for the report.
 

Did the SIM start with £0 value? Acquiring customers is a cost factor/expense that something like this can make really cheap.
All the people offering SIMs and/or value for the dead UM cards are paying to aquire customers. It does cost and if you can find a cheap way to do it you will end up with a lot of customers. Does anyone remember the good old days when PayPal was buying customers?

FWIW, Lebara did the same thing to me at a shopping center in Spain - though I had to pay EUR 5 for a SIM that had that much on it already (I also needed to give my passport for registration).

registration
 

Yes all SIM cards issued in Spain now have to have identity registration / proof. If you have a card from a previous visit you will have to arrange to register them with your Spanish service provider or they will be switched off in the autumn. (No such requirement in UK where they hand out sim cards like sweets!).