question about usa sim cards

[snaimon]

Probably off topic....

My wife and children were in Canada in 2003. I had purchased a prepaid Fido SIM from eBay USA. That worked fine. After they returned, I sold it on eBay to someone else. At that time our T-Mo prepaids did not roam in Canada.

I take it the situation has changed since then. I think Rogers and Fido are now one company. I am a bit surprised your regulators would allow such a merger to result in a monopoly.

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As to the US GSM prepaids, I often look at eBay.de. You can always find ATT or T-MO US prepaids being offered there. I don't know how well they sell, but I suspect there is some demand for them. Thus, if a visitor purchased a US prepaid SIM, I think it would be possible to sell it on his/her native eBay or elsewhere to someone else rather than try to keep the # alive. The $100 upfront investment for 1000 minutes might not be everyone's cup of tea.

I made a very costly mistake buying 2 Malta prepaids and trying to keep them alive. I lost one where I had invested > $50 and sold the other at a huge discount. Would have been cheaper to buy new ones or use my international SIMs.

Stan

[bylo]

Originally Posted by snaimon

I think Rogers and Fido are now one company. I am a bit surprised your regulators would allow such a merger to result in a monopoly.

Yes Rogers bought Fido and now they are both the essentially the same. There are two developments that may open up Canada to more GSM competition:

1. There is a spectrum auction in progress. Something like 40% of that spectrum is designated for new players only. It's highly unlikely that the winner of such an auction would use anything but GSM. Also, the incumbent wireless providers are required to lease towers and cell repeaters to new players for at least 5 years at "reasonable" rates in order to give them a chance to succeed.

2. Telus, the main western Canadian telco, is currently CDMA-only. However there is speculation that they will start to convert their network to GSM, starting in western Canada, in order to participate in lucrative roaming revenue from foreign visitors to the upcoming Vancouver Olympic games. (Rogers charges something like $2 or $3 per minute for roaming and gets away with it because there is no GSM alternative carrier.)