Report on using Orange Mobicarte in France

johnwt1951 · **Report on using Orange Mobicarte in France -** 16-02-2009, 06:07

I've just spent 3 weeks in France. Lovely. Thanks to the info on these pages and elsewhere I purchased and used a prepaid Orange "mobicarte" - mainly for internet access from my iPhone. Here's a few observations from that experience to help others.

1. At the first Orange shop I went to in Paris the helpful and apparently well informed salesman was all apologetic that the Internet Max deal (9 Euro for 500 MB of data) doesn't apply to prepaid SIMs - only to long term contracts. Hmm! I re-read (and re-translated) all the info I had found and decided that I didn't agree! So I found another helpful salesman in another Orange shop. No problem! He sold me a Mobicarte for 30 Euro (with 5 Euro credit) and an extra 10 Euro credit and gave me all the advice and instruction I needed to get up and going.

2. Setting up Internet Max is easy. Dialling #123# lets you recharge with extra credit. Then you can work through the menu (in french) to purchase the internet max option. Wham - the 9 Euros disappears off your balance and you're ready to go!

3. I can't remember now but I don't think I had to tell my phone to use orange.fr as the APN. I think that happened automatically once I was on the Orange network.

4. Then I was surfing to my heart's content. Good 3G access in all the towns. Slower Edge access in the countryside. Great for maps and weather, etc, etc. Don't know what my total traffic would have been over the 3 weeks but reportedly the 500 MB is a "soft" limit anyway and is not strictly enforced except to prevent blatant abuse. Don't know if that's true.

5. Phone rates are not brilliant with the mobicarte but that wasn't its prime use.

6. What a shame that Apple has done dirty deals with the Telcos and won't allow Skype on their device. I did use the Skype web application "IM+ for Skype" quite a bit. This worked well but is not always cheap because you are paying for two Skype Out calls at once - OK if they are landlines but a bit Exy if they are both mobiles.

7. So Internet Max - great for internet. BUT BEWARE - HERE IS THE STING. The Orange salesman warned me that "email is expensive - better to use webmail (or equivalent) via internet". I didn't quite figure what he was saying. I was pulling email down manually and thought he was probably talking about the heavy use of push email so I wasn't too concerned .... but ... turns out there is a 10 MB limit on email under this internet max deal. After that, email starts eating phone credit. Worse than that, some correspondents report that all outgoing SMTP traffic is charged directly against the phone credit regardless of the 10 MB limit. In any event, email started eating my phone credit at a great rate.

8. No big deal. The safe option is to switch off email and use webmail (or equivalent) instead. Then you are home and hosed and can surf to your heart's content.

9. Validity of the mobicarte is an issue. Credit expires after a month or two depending on amount. I think there is also a 5 Euro per month minimum spend. Not a problem if you are using it continuously or for a short intense period but makes it no good for occasional intermittent use over several months.

10. Overall a good deal - especially for iPhone users or others wanting mobile internet.

I've got my "used" mobicarte (still with 9 Euros of credit) up for sale on ebay.com.au if anyone's interested.

DaveRo · 18-02-2009, 13:13

Thanks for all that. It sounds better than my last experience of Mobicarte: http://www.prepaidgsm.net/forum/euro...rs-france.html - 2 years ago

The mobicarte I bought then, on ebay, way registered in somebody else's name, which gave me a lot of trouble. I never found a way of changing it. Whoever buys it from you might have the same problem.

Were you able to check how much data credit you had - online or by SMS?

Dave

cfarivar · 21-02-2009, 09:13

I've been living in France since October 2008 and have been using a Mobicarte and was hit by that stupid mail overcharge -- twice! I ended up losing 80€ before I realized that for some godawful reason, Orange treats email differently than web traffic. So yeah, no Mail app on my unlocked iPhone for me -- Gmail thank you very much.

Also, if you buy a larger recharge card like 100€, where you get 150€ worth of credit, and you transfer some of that to a friend (5€, for ex), beware that that credit expires in a week. I learned that one the hard way too.

Orange has a current promotion for the new "Special Edition" Mobicarte where you pay 20€ of credit, then you get the option of free calls to Orange mobiles either 7h-17h during the week, 19h-00h during the week, or all day weekends. Not sure how long this one will last.

Also, I've got two Orange SIMs that I'll gladly send out from France in early May, or when I'm back Stateside in early May.

jhanlon · 25-03-2009, 21:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by cfarivar

Also, I've got two Orange SIMs that I'll gladly send out from France in early May, or when I'm back Stateside in early May.

I will be in France for three months starting mid-July and may be interested in your SIMs. Please email me at jhanlon [at] comcast [dot] net

Jim Hanlon

Lobby · 13-05-2009, 17:16

This is exactly what I'm looking for to access internet and email while on holidays later in June/July.

The 10Mb for email traffic is a bit limiting though. Anyone know how thats measured, i.e. is it SMTP traffic or is it traffic via a specific port?

Or are there any rumours of that 10Mb limit being scrapped?

(Incidentally I bought a mobicarte from ebay.fr but cannot recharge (add credit) it. I get the following message (via the orange website):

"Vous devez avoir 1 mois d'ancienneté sur votre compte pour pouvoir utiliser le service rechargement illico"

That seems to say that I need to use the service for a month first??? With only €5 of credit??

maccoy · 14-05-2009, 09:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lobby

Incidentally I bought a mobicarte from ebay.fr but cannot recharge (add credit) it. I get the following message (via the orange website):

"Vous devez avoir 1 mois d'ancienneté sur votre compte pour pouvoir utiliser le service rechargement illico"

That seems to say that I need to use the service for a month first??? With only €5 of credit??

The message says you can't recharge online but only with scratch cards in the firs month.

engelatreyu · 22-09-2009, 20:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by cfarivar

I've been living in France since October 2008 and have been using a Mobicarte and was hit by that stupid mail overcharge -- twice! I ended up losing 80€ before I realized that for some godawful reason, Orange treats email differently than web traffic. So yeah, no Mail app on my unlocked iPhone for me -- Gmail thank you very much.

Also, if you buy a larger recharge card like 100€, where you get 150€ worth of credit, and you transfer some of that to a friend (5€, for ex), beware that that credit expires in a week. I learned that one the hard way too.

Orange has a current promotion for the new "Special Edition" Mobicarte where you pay 20€ of credit, then you get the option of free calls to Orange mobiles either 7h-17h during the week, 19h-00h during the week, or all day weekends. Not sure how long this one will last.

Also, I've got two Orange SIMs that I'll gladly send out from France in early May, or when I'm back Stateside in early May.

I had that exact 100E problem. I got a Iphone, unlocked and jailbroken from the united states and arrived to france one week ago. I charged the mobicarte with the 100E +50 free. I got the credit and everything was ok until yesterday I Realize my account was empty when I NEVER used the internet connection of the phone (nor the internet apps). Besides that I went and checked on Orange.fr personal account info and it stated that I was wired to the internet at some hours where i was asleep. My mail was iphone configurated though ( even before I came back to France) and I just wrote to service clientele about this issue.

Has anyone got to solve the problem? and has orange given them their money back ( since i never requested an cellular internet connection service for my simcard). Can anyone explain me how do I AVOID the iphone going on the internet without me asking ( I am only interested in using just thE wifi connection from my house's and workplace's modem) I mean i don't want the phone to be connecting to 3G or EDGE or just INTERNET unless I ask him to.

Thank you, I would really appreciate some help on this issue since I am not a cellphone "connaisseur" and usually this kind of phone bill issues in France are complicated ( and I need and want to have my money reimbursed) since those 100E is what I spend in 6 months of cellphone communications and I happen to be a not wealthy person at all. Thanks again

b1g · **Availability update? Tethering/hotspot use? -** 09-10-2009, 14:43

Availability update (October 2009):
Does anyone have any more current information on this offer? The initial post is from Feb 2009 and a scan of this thread and other sites say it is/was 9€/mo, then there's a post above to suggest it's now 12€, in Corsica at least, and for some it's not or no longer available. From Orange's website, the Internet Max option I only find as a daily add-on for 3€, on Mobicarte. I'm going to France next week and am ordering a Mobicarte on the web - it's 15€ including delivery and 5€ credit from Orange's website - and I'll be happy to report back at a later date but for now I'm just wondering if anyone has in the last month activated Internet Max at 9€/mo and how - via their phone (is it straightforward to avg/non-fluent French speakers?) or at an Orange Shop?

Email: Does anyone know if the S60 Gmail app uses one of the "charging" ports for email usage? Even if secure ports like 993, 587, or 465 are available and charge-free?

Connect PC via tethering or hotspot: Has anyone successfully used their mobile either as a bluetooth modem to connect their laptop to the web (tethering), or even create a WiFi hotspot using an app like JoikuSpot? I would have thought the latter is possible, but tethering I don't know.

Thanks for any input!

Teddy-bear · 18-10-2009, 10:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by b1g

Availability update (October 2009):
Does anyone have any more current information on this offer? The initial post is from Feb 2009 and a scan of this thread and other sites say it is/was 9€/mo, then there's a post above to suggest it's now 12€, in Corsica at least, and for some it's not or no longer available. From Orange's website, the Internet Max option I only find as a daily add-on for 3€, on Mobicarte. I'm going to France next week and am ordering a Mobicarte on the web - it's 15€ including delivery and 5€ credit from Orange's website - and I'll be happy to report back at a later date but for now I'm just wondering if anyone has in the last month activated Internet Max at 9€/mo and how - via their phone (is it straightforward to avg/non-fluent French speakers?) or at an Orange Shop?

Email: Does anyone know if the S60 Gmail app uses one of the "charging" ports for email usage? Even if secure ports like 993, 587, or 465 are available and charge-free?

Connect PC via tethering or hotspot: Has anyone successfully used their mobile either as a bluetooth modem to connect their laptop to the web (tethering), or even create a WiFi hotspot using an app like JoikuSpot? I would have thought the latter is possible, but tethering I don't know.

Thanks for any input!

I am intersesting also

Can you give us the result what it is now on MOBICARTE?

TX a lot

orangina · 13-12-2010, 15:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by b1g

Email: Does anyone know if the S60 Gmail app uses one of the "charging" ports for email usage? Even if secure ports like 993, 587, or 465 are available and charge-free?
Thanks for any input!

993, 465, ... are definitively not charge free, avoid these ports or inscribe the mail option for 9 Euro/Month

	(#1)
johnwt1951 (Offline) Junior Member Newbie Posts: 9 Join Date: 13 Jan 2006 Location: Australia Country:	Report on using Orange Mobicarte in France - 16-02-2009, 06:07 I've just spent 3 weeks in France. Lovely. Thanks to the info on these pages and elsewhere I purchased and used a prepaid Orange "mobicarte" - mainly for internet access from my iPhone. Here's a few observations from that experience to help others. 1. At the first Orange shop I went to in Paris the helpful and apparently well informed salesman was all apologetic that the Internet Max deal (9 Euro for 500 MB of data) doesn't apply to prepaid SIMs - only to long term contracts. Hmm! I re-read (and re-translated) all the info I had found and decided that I didn't agree! So I found another helpful salesman in another Orange shop. No problem! He sold me a Mobicarte for 30 Euro (with 5 Euro credit) and an extra 10 Euro credit and gave me all the advice and instruction I needed to get up and going. 2. Setting up Internet Max is easy. Dialling #123# lets you recharge with extra credit. Then you can work through the menu (in french) to purchase the internet max option. Wham - the 9 Euros disappears off your balance and you're ready to go! 3. I can't remember now but I don't think I had to tell my phone to use orange.fr as the APN. I think that happened automatically once I was on the Orange network. 4. Then I was surfing to my heart's content. Good 3G access in all the towns. Slower Edge access in the countryside. Great for maps and weather, etc, etc. Don't know what my total traffic would have been over the 3 weeks but reportedly the 500 MB is a "soft" limit anyway and is not strictly enforced except to prevent blatant abuse. Don't know if that's true. 5. Phone rates are not brilliant with the mobicarte but that wasn't its prime use. 6. What a shame that Apple has done dirty deals with the Telcos and won't allow Skype on their device. I did use the Skype web application "IM+ for Skype" quite a bit. This worked well but is not always cheap because you are paying for two Skype Out calls at once - OK if they are landlines but a bit Exy if they are both mobiles. 7. So Internet Max - great for internet. BUT BEWARE - HERE IS THE STING. The Orange salesman warned me that "email is expensive - better to use webmail (or equivalent) via internet". I didn't quite figure what he was saying. I was pulling email down manually and thought he was probably talking about the heavy use of push email so I wasn't too concerned .... but ... turns out there is a 10 MB limit on email under this internet max deal. After that, email starts eating phone credit. Worse than that, some correspondents report that all outgoing SMTP traffic is charged directly against the phone credit regardless of the 10 MB limit. In any event, email started eating my phone credit at a great rate. 8. No big deal. The safe option is to switch off email and use webmail (or equivalent) instead. Then you are home and hosed and can surf to your heart's content. 9. Validity of the mobicarte is an issue. Credit expires after a month or two depending on amount. I think there is also a 5 Euro per month minimum spend. Not a problem if you are using it continuously or for a short intense period but makes it no good for occasional intermittent use over several months. 10. Overall a good deal - especially for iPhone users or others wanting mobile internet. I've got my "used" mobicarte (still with 9 Euros of credit) up for sale on ebay.com.au if anyone's interested.

	(#2)
DaveRo (Offline) Senior Member Prepaid Fan Posts: 153 Join Date: 07 Jul 2006 Country:	18-02-2009, 13:13 Thanks for all that. It sounds better than my last experience of Mobicarte: http://www.prepaidgsm.net/forum/euro...rs-france.html - 2 years ago The mobicarte I bought then, on ebay, way registered in somebody else's name, which gave me a lot of trouble. I never found a way of changing it. Whoever buys it from you might have the same problem. Were you able to check how much data credit you had - online or by SMS? Dave Last edited by DaveRo; 18-02-2009 at 13:17.. Reason: Correction

	(#3)
cfarivar (Offline) Junior Member Newbie Posts: 2 Join Date: 28 Jan 2009 Country:	21-02-2009, 09:13 I've been living in France since October 2008 and have been using a Mobicarte and was hit by that stupid mail overcharge -- twice! I ended up losing 80€ before I realized that for some godawful reason, Orange treats email differently than web traffic. So yeah, no Mail app on my unlocked iPhone for me -- Gmail thank you very much. Also, if you buy a larger recharge card like 100€, where you get 150€ worth of credit, and you transfer some of that to a friend (5€, for ex), beware that that credit expires in a week. I learned that one the hard way too. Orange has a current promotion for the new "Special Edition" Mobicarte where you pay 20€ of credit, then you get the option of free calls to Orange mobiles either 7h-17h during the week, 19h-00h during the week, or all day weekends. Not sure how long this one will last. Also, I've got two Orange SIMs that I'll gladly send out from France in early May, or when I'm back Stateside in early May.

	(#5)
Lobby (Offline) Junior Member Newbie Posts: 4 Join Date: 13 May 2009 Country:	13-05-2009, 17:16 This is exactly what I'm looking for to access internet and email while on holidays later in June/July. The 10Mb for email traffic is a bit limiting though. Anyone know how thats measured, i.e. is it SMTP traffic or is it traffic via a specific port? Or are there any rumours of that 10Mb limit being scrapped? (Incidentally I bought a mobicarte from ebay.fr but cannot recharge (add credit) it. I get the following message (via the orange website): "Vous devez avoir 1 mois d'ancienneté sur votre compte pour pouvoir utiliser le service rechargement illico" That seems to say that I need to use the service for a month first??? With only €5 of credit??

	(#8)
b1g (Offline) Junior Member Newbie Posts: 3 Join Date: 09 Oct 2009 Country:	Availability update? Tethering/hotspot use? - 09-10-2009, 14:43 Availability update (October 2009): Does anyone have any more current information on this offer? The initial post is from Feb 2009 and a scan of this thread and other sites say it is/was 9€/mo, then there's a post above to suggest it's now 12€, in Corsica at least, and for some it's not or no longer available. From Orange's website, the Internet Max option I only find as a daily add-on for 3€, on Mobicarte. I'm going to France next week and am ordering a Mobicarte on the web - it's 15€ including delivery and 5€ credit from Orange's website - and I'll be happy to report back at a later date but for now I'm just wondering if anyone has in the last month activated Internet Max at 9€/mo and how - via their phone (is it straightforward to avg/non-fluent French speakers?) or at an Orange Shop? Email: Does anyone know if the S60 Gmail app uses one of the "charging" ports for email usage? Even if secure ports like 993, 587, or 465 are available and charge-free? Connect PC via tethering or hotspot: Has anyone successfully used their mobile either as a bluetooth modem to connect their laptop to the web (tethering), or even create a WiFi hotspot using an app like JoikuSpot? I would have thought the latter is possible, but tethering I don't know. Thanks for any input!