Tuenti SIM for Data

[NFH]

I have just spent two weeks working in Spain, in Barcelona and Madrid. My two Spanish colleagues are on Vodafone and Orange, and there were many places, both at work and elsewhere, where I had a signal and they did not. In fact, with Tuenti (running on Movistar), there was not one place where I experienced no coverage. Even on the 300km/h AVE train from Barcelona to Madrid, I had my laptop tethered to my iPhone and the connection didn't drop out once during the whole journey, even in tunnels.

I was told by Spanish colleagues that Movistar is well known to have the best coverage and Orange the worst, and that this is reflected in each network's prices. However, in the case of Tuenti, you get the cheapest price and the best coverage.

One downside of Tuenti is its charges for inserting its SIM cards into iPhones. Whenever a SIM card is inserted into an iPhone, it sends one or more hidden SMS messages to +44 7786 205094 or +44 7537 4102X1, even if FaceTime and iMessage and turned off. Tuenti charges for these messages at €0.73 each. Other networks zero-rate SMS sent to these numbers because the customer did not choose to send them, including other Telefonica networks and MVNOs (for example Movistar Spain, O2 Ireland, O2 UK, O2 Czech Republic and MVNO Giffgaff UK). After getting irrelevant responses from Tuenti such as "we don't support FaceTime", I have complained to Tuenti but I am still waiting for a response after two weeks, despite them logging it as a formal complaint.