PrePaidGSM.net Forum (Archived) - View Single Post - United Mobile - dead, CallBlue - dead, FreeGlobalSim

MATHA531 · 17-05-2009, 20:20

Let me try to explain my thinking on this...

In the "glory" days of UM (AKA riing), I used both cbw and enlinea for my calls out along with the free calls in. I was paying something like 14¢ (all prices here US) to make a call from wherever back to the USA. The service was fairly reliable too, except in France (which has always seemed to be a problem...do the French telcoms block these calls??)....

In any event, then we had the staggering increase in termination fees to +423 so that using cbw and enlinea became uneconomical. Then I switched to O9 which until this very January I was paying 11¢/minute on enlinea (well it was supposed to be 16¢/minute to an Icelandic mobile but for some reason, they had my number not pegged as a mobile)....it worked as late as this past January. In the interim, I had investigated +44 UM and the listed prices on both enlinea and cbw for calls to the USA on +44 phones was close to 50¢/minute (haven't checked it in a while)...France and Germany were listed at around 27¢/minute (and they worked okay this past January) and Estonia was listed somewhat cheaper but for some reason, I could not get the callbacks on my Air Baltic phone while in France (but I could on Orange FR and the triggering numbers were one digit apart!)...

I will be travelling back to Germany, France and the UK next month....with UM being deceased, well I still have a live French sim with Orange FR...I probably would use it while in France with enlinea (although since the French steal your credit, sob's that they are whenever your initial top up wears off, I generally do try to use it up)...I've been put onto a German provider called sonoma or something like that...I, if I can figure out the German web site (there should be a rule they all have to use English for language illiterates like me)...they seem to charge 0,05€ or something like that to call the USA...failing that I might opt to use the Vodafone UK passport promotion coupled perhaps with a calling card (still pricey at 20p/minute)...for receiving calls and of course in the UK there's no problem....oh for the simple days of UM+423 and low termination fees!

	(#16)
MATHA531 (Offline) Senior Member Prepaid Specialist Posts: 869 Join Date: 15 Oct 2004 Country:	17-05-2009, 20:20 Let me try to explain my thinking on this... In the "glory" days of UM (AKA riing), I used both cbw and enlinea for my calls out along with the free calls in. I was paying something like 14¢ (all prices here US) to make a call from wherever back to the USA. The service was fairly reliable too, except in France (which has always seemed to be a problem...do the French telcoms block these calls??).... In any event, then we had the staggering increase in termination fees to +423 so that using cbw and enlinea became uneconomical. Then I switched to O9 which until this very January I was paying 11¢/minute on enlinea (well it was supposed to be 16¢/minute to an Icelandic mobile but for some reason, they had my number not pegged as a mobile)....it worked as late as this past January. In the interim, I had investigated +44 UM and the listed prices on both enlinea and cbw for calls to the USA on +44 phones was close to 50¢/minute (haven't checked it in a while)...France and Germany were listed at around 27¢/minute (and they worked okay this past January) and Estonia was listed somewhat cheaper but for some reason, I could not get the callbacks on my Air Baltic phone while in France (but I could on Orange FR and the triggering numbers were one digit apart!)... I will be travelling back to Germany, France and the UK next month....with UM being deceased, well I still have a live French sim with Orange FR...I probably would use it while in France with enlinea (although since the French steal your credit, sob's that they are whenever your initial top up wears off, I generally do try to use it up)...I've been put onto a German provider called sonoma or something like that...I, if I can figure out the German web site (there should be a rule they all have to use English for language illiterates like me)...they seem to charge 0,05€ or something like that to call the USA...failing that I might opt to use the Vodafone UK passport promotion coupled perhaps with a calling card (still pricey at 20p/minute)...for receiving calls and of course in the UK there's no problem....oh for the simple days of UM+423 and low termination fees!