Prepaid SIM in Italy?

[bauruine]

Hello BLC,

my problem is that I will use the SIM immediately after the arrival. Thus it is necessary to activate Internet access from abroad.

The other is that coverage from TIM is clearly better in my driving/sailing area, than those of WIND.

Thanks.

[BLC]

Originally Posted by bauruine

Hello BLC,

my problem is that I will use the SIM immediately after the arrival. Thus it is necessary to activate Internet access from abroad.

The other is that coverage from TIM is clearly better in my driving/sailing area, than those of WIND.

Thanks.

Unfortunately I haven't found a simple solution to the problem of maintaining a TIM sim. I suppose as we have an Italian bank account we could try and set up a periodic payment scheme but it dosen't seem worth the effort when WIND is so easy to work with. A simple text message when we go to Italy gets me a data plan and the same to cancel it when we leave and every 10 months or so I addsome money via my Canadian Visa card.

[Effendi]

When you land in Catania you go to the Tabacchi store (there's surely more than one inside the airport) and refill it in a couple of minutes. If you didn't de-activate the option before you left Italy your option will be still active (but you will pay also for the months you didn't use it...)

[bauruine]

Hi Effendi,

thank you for that hint and ..

Originally Posted by Effendi

If you didn't de-activate the option before you left Italy your option will be still active (but you will pay also for the months you didn't use it...)

.. is that really true, that the 100 ORE rate will be charged for these 3 months even if it was not used?
I understood that the option ist stopped if the amount of money is do low for the next month.

regards bauruine

[wco81]

I canceled my 100 Ore plan by SMS but it was still showing up on wind.it when I logged in just before leaving Italy.

[Effendi]

When you run out of credit they should stop billing you (it's prepaid, if you go to zero you shouldn't go further below...). But that doesn't always happen.
I never used TIM so I don't know how they behave. But my suggestion is always to DEACTIVATE the option when you leave. Otherwise prepare to get bad surprises...

@ wco81: what does the 155.it say now? The option should be inactive, I suppose. Wind works quite well with these things.

[dg7feq]

@effendi:
by the way: my brother is surfing with the TIM prepaid-card in "Südtirol" at the moment and he says the speed and coverage is excellent! He made network search with the UMTS stick (the 10 euro offer from Vodafone germany, was mentioned in another thread here already), and TIM is the only UMTS signal available most of the time.
He bought it in an electronics store as the fuel station at passo di brennero was closed for some reason when he passed by...

Chris

[Effendi]

TIM surely has the most widespread UMTS/HSPA network in Italy, no doubts about it. And in more rural areas it's probably fast too (it's not in towns). They have problems with voice quality (probably the worst in Italy), missed calls, bad call centre, but for being a former monopolist they have rather cheap plans, expecially compared to Vodafone.

[dg7feq]

Yeah, we can not complain, he gets constantly >2.5 Mbit indoors, dont know if he tested outdoors already.... And 9 Euro for 40 Hours is not bad either.

Chris

[bauruine]

Hello Effendi,

my problem is done. I found someone who recharged my TIM account. He went to a TIM store, payed the amount of 24.- Euro (19+5) and activated the 100 Ore option for me. There was no charge for the last 4 months.

Originally Posted by Effendi

When you run out of credit they should stop billing you (it's prepaid, if you go to zero you shouldn't go further below...). But that doesn't always happen.

In this case it did not happen

Originally Posted by Effendi

I never used TIM so I don't know how they behave. But my suggestion is always to DEACTIVATE the option when you leave. Otherwise prepare to get bad surprises...

I will do so by sending INTERNET100 OFF as a SMS to 40916 .

regards
bauruine