Israel GPRS rates

[sperial]

You will have to top up at an Orange booth or a post office, as topping by phone or the internet requires an Israeli credit card.
The BigTalk IVR can be changed to English by calling *111. To change the voice mail language call *159.
The7c/min international calls are similar to callback. for the USA call *313 , when the system answers dial the US number (including the international prefix and than #. The rate is NIS 0.29/min and includes the air time.

[davidtheprof]

thanks, very useful info!

[moua]

Thanks for *159 i didn't know it.

Also, to add packages (like data) call *4555

You can found great infos here also :
Israel - Pay as you go sim with data Wiki

sperial : highly suggest orange bigtalk for travelers,
rami levy is cheaper for voice but bigtalk is much more convenient :

You find sim and topup everywhere, no monthly charge (useful when you come only once a year), complete offer (data...), and best of all, an english IVR and customer service.

Also, like said on the above site, if you use bonus card topup it can be much cheaper.


PS : my sister is in Israel now, and she took a sim only after 2 days.
meanwhile she used her french vodafone sim, she didn't had data (10€/mb... desactivated), and she called at 2,5€/min.
That's, for 10min, 25€, or 125 NIS (and she called more in 2 days, not including incoming calls at 1,5€/min).

Usually when i come i take a 150 NIS bonus topup for a month, that's give me 5GB data, a lot to orange network, plus ~100min to others (less in fact, because of sms) and i call overseas with VoIP.

Ok, with hot/golan it's 30% cheaper for more, but with contract, and rami levy is not convenient.
But anyway, when you travel your are used to pay more than locals

The situation can be different in europe, when you can stay just 2-3 days for a weekend (sometimes less) in a country.
Most people are going in Israel at least for a week.

My 2 cents.
Again, thanks for your tips about israeli market, you know much more than even techies.
Don't hesitate to ask if you need my expertise about the french market

[sperial]

I agree that Orange BigTalk is more convenient then Rami-Levy, as they have outlets in city centers, as opposed to Rami-Levy's supermarkets in the outskirts.

The strange thing about Orange is that international rates per minute are about one third than for local calls.

I am not sure that the NIS 150 "bonus" card includes any data, as it is not stated in the Orange site. However, is includes NIS 100 for international calls.

This week another MVNO, Home-Cellular, started selling prepaid SIM cards, I will open a new thread later today,

[sperial]

Home Cellular, an MVNO run by the Home-Center DIY chain and running on Cellcom's 2G and 3G network, started offering a prepaid plan. The SIM card costs NIS 39, Local calls are around NIS 0.39 (but vary according to top-up type) SMS are NIS 0.39 ans data NIS 0.50/MB.
SIM cards can be purchased at the Home Center DIY stores or through the internes. Balance can be boughtat the same stores or gy phone (see page 5 for English)

[davidtheprof]

saw these on ebay, and was thinking of buying a couple for mid-December trip.

Israel mobile carrier ORANGE New Sim Card 3G Without Contract CHARGED WITH 10$ | eBay

They don't say Big Talk like the ones you can order from the Post Office, but I presume this is just the plan name, and once there, I can add a data and call plan? Anything else to be wary of?

thanks!

[sperial]

All Orange prepaid plans are called "BigTalk" and the *111 us the BigTalk customer service,