Lidl

[inquisitor]

What number(s) are you sending your texts to? Is this definitely a mobile number? Do you use the correct international format? Have you tried sending a text to your own number?

Also you could try power-cycling your phone, make sure the number of the SMS center is correct (+491760000443) and lastly manually select another network (usually you can roam on multiple network abroad).

[veeRob]

Originally Posted by inquisitor

What number(s) are you sending your texts to? Is this definitely a mobile number? Do you use the correct international format? Have you tried sending a text to your own number?

Also you could try power-cycling your phone, make sure the number of the SMS center is correct (+491760000443) and lastly manually select another network (usually you can roam on multiple network abroad).

Yes, definitely a mobile number as the first person I tried to SMS was a reply from an incoming SMS. I've also tried typing in #'s in various formats and none work.

I actually don't think I've power cycled the phone since I left Germany. Just did so, but I don't want to test it right now as I'm in Croatia and the SMS charges are very high. I will try again on Monday when I'm back in EU (Budapest). Thank you.

If that doesn't work, I will try selecting another network as I found the menu option for that. I don't see any menu option for the SMS center number... there's an option under Messages that says "Service com. editor" -- is that it? There was no number entered when I went into that setting.

Thank you so much for your help. Hopefully I can fix this when I get to Budapest.

[inquisitor]

A warning to everybody planning to purchase a Lidl SIM: Fonic, the company behind the Lidl tariff, have recently started sending out letters to the address provided during activation in order to confirm registration details. It is understood that Fonic temporarily disable SIM cards if the confirmation letter returns due to undeliverableness until a valid address has been provided. So when activating a Lidl SIM make sure you use an address to which the confirmation letter will be successfully delivered (e.g. a hotel or a friend temporarily attaching your name to his mailbox).

[inquisitor]

P.S.: This applies to new activations only. Existing customers are not affected.

[kuba.g]

Any idea if this is due to some (new) law in Germany which imposes the duty on the operators to do a little check-up on their clients?
I cannot imagine why any operators would want to do this themselves...?

[inquisitor]

I'm not aware of any new law. The obligation to register customers' identity has been in force for years. Either the regulatory authority has ordered Fonic to somehow verify the correctness of registration details by sending out this letter since the former registration process has been found being insufficient or Fonic indeed try to ban shorttime visitors (who usually lack a proper address in Germany) from becoming customers. Operators usually pay license fees for their billing and CRM systems based on the number of customers, so a visitor using his SIM only once for a week or two may become unprofitable if they need to pay license fees for months or years.

[kuba.g]

Originally Posted by inquisitor

Either the regulatory authority has ordered Fonic to somehow verify the correctness of registration details by sending out this letter since the former registration process has been found being insufficient

But this would hold for pretty much all operators in Germany, don't you think?

Originally Posted by inquisitor

Operators usually pay license fees for their billing and CRM systems based on the number of customers, so a visitor using his SIM only once for a week or two may become unprofitable if they need to pay license fees for months or years.

That's also quite interesting, as Germany is the only country I know of in Europe, where operators give you unlimited account validity! (Suggesting that they don't mind inactive customers). It all seems rather contradicting...

[inquisitor]

Originally Posted by kuba.g

But this would hold for pretty much all operators in Germany, don't you think?

Indeed. However few have such lax registration procedures like Fonic. Some operators require an ID upon purchase (e.g. T-Mobile, Vodafone) while others perform some form of verification by selling their SIM cards only online and so customers are forced to provide credit card or bank account information besides a valid address in order to get their SIM cards.

That's also quite interesting, as Germany is the only country I know of in Europe, where operators give you unlimited account validity! (Suggesting that they don't mind inactive customers). It all seems rather contradicting...

Yes, but they all reserve the right to cancel the underlying contract at some point and e.g. T-Mobile and Vodafone have been doing so. One of my Vodafone Callya SIMs was recently disabled after three months of inactivity. However they immediately reactivated it upon my request.
I guess it's a question of operators' license agreements/costs and of the ratio of unused SIM cards. At some point they will all start acting if necessary. In any case I'm a bit surprised by Fonic taking such measures since their tariffs are pretty good so I expect them to have a rather high ARPU for a prepaid provider.

[veeRob]

Just got to Hungary last night. Tried to SMS, same problem. "Check operator services." Tried multiple providers, still same error. Any other ideas?

[inquisitor]

As you're apparently using a Nokia phone (at least the Google results for "Service com. editor" suggest this) please go to Message | Options | Message Settings | Sending Profiles - select the first item among the Sending Profiles and edit the Message centre number to match the following: +491760000443
For "Messages sent as" choose "Text" and save this.

Now retry sending a message and also try sending a text to you own Lidl number to rule out an inter-network problem. If it still fails you should perhaps try sending a text from another phone to rule out that there's a problem with your phone.

Also it would be good to know if you can receive SMS from other people.