Simyo Spain €5/month data (upto 500MB) - Page 6

gaidal · 23-12-2009, 02:57

I'd like to warn everyone against this one.

Firstly, as the previous poster said it seems to be gprs only and is pretty slow, although I do get a 3G symbol outdoors. But that's not what makes me disappointed because if you look closely it doesn't say anything about speed for the €5 plan, only the €24.99 one.

I've had it for 5 days on my iPhone and used 20 + 4 mb (down + up), and for this they've charged me €6.11! The tariff on the website that sounds so good isn't what they're actually using, they charge for every connection up to at least €0.99 + tax or more per day, even if I'm only using 1 mb in total. This wouldn't have mattered if it actually stopped at €5 but it doesn't.

I had a Spanish speaking friend call the customer service, the first two times to find out if they meant €5 maximum per day or per month, and the first and second person told her different things. The third time was a few days later, to find out why they charge me so much: They clearly tried to talk themselves out of it, letting her talk to different people, having her wait, and in between giving random explanations that were a joke, such as "look at this session at this date and time, you got it for free because you had reached the limit right?" or "well this plan is not meant for downloading, only for simple stuff like checking your e-mail, it might be better if you don't use it a lot...". As I said I had only used 20 mb down in 5 days. Do they think it's still 1999 or what?
When we threatened to report them to a consumer rights organization they finally said that they would look into it (after 30 min) but didn't offer anything immediately, not even a reference number until my friend demanded it.
What a customer service, it's like the wild west. :P

It's kind of sad isn't it, because simyo's 500 mb for €5 would have been the cheapest Spanish data plan by far, had it been true!

Or has anyone had it work for them?

laptopnomad · 28-12-2009, 15:09

Thanks so much for sharing!

I can relate to the experience - not getting to what's being promised and then trying to work a local helpdesk to get the truth out. As i experienced so many times, DATA plans are not understood well enough by local helpdesks.

As it seems to me Simyo has several problems to solve here. Foremost education & training of the helpdesk.

Because the 500Mb was way to small for me, I choose Yoigo - so far so good - knock on wood.

It gives me 3.1Gb of 3G for € 93,- (ex tax) a month with a daily limit of 100 Mb - after which speeds drops to GPRS alike. It's not the cheapest I know.

So a bit of my helpdesk experience:
Yoigo has AFAIK three English speaking operators - all 3 know the DATA plan well enough to help Internet savvy heavy users. Their e-mail response in English is within 36 hours.

And yes, there are (rural) parts of Spain that are still GPRS only, of course depending on the cellphone network. I got a few as well.

So this place PrePaidGSM is the only place I know where to get a bit of feedback on the actual quality of 3G operators.
It's not all about the price IMHO, also the (underlying) network and the people who run the helpdesk.

My biggest problem was to get what i wanted in the local phone shop in a language i don't speak.

Here's my experience.

petkow · 18-02-2010, 13:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by laptopnomad

It gives me 3.1Gb of 3G for € 93,- (ex tax) a month with a daily limit of 100 Mb - after which speeds drops to GPRS alike. It's not the cheapest I know.

Again, apologies for this revival of this old thread but WTF!!! I am just stunned at this rate!! How do Yoigo charge 100 odd euros (with tax) for 3 Gig of data??!! That has to be the poorest value I have ever heard of in Spain.

inquisitor · 03-01-2010, 21:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by pete_l

[*]Here's the killer. The data link is GPRS only. Not 3G: just modem speeds of 3 or 4 kByte/second. Simyo never tell you this and it's not at all obvious from the stuff they send you. One small giveaway is that you have to set the APN to gprs-service.com

Since I'm in need of Spanish SIM for a 3-weeks-stay in Gran Canaria, I checked several Spanish websites (e.g. Simyo lanza su tarifa plana de internet) including simyo's, where it clearly states, that bandwidth amounts to 3.6 MBit/s. Also the coverage map of simyo explicitly shows 3G coverage.
The APN "gprs-service.com" also applies for simyo's postpaid data plan (€ 24.99/month sin impuestos), which definitley provides HSDPA-speed.
Did you guys just happen to be outside of 3G coverage or was the serving cell just congested?

petkow · 18-02-2010, 13:17

Simyo have changed tariff since 4th Feb. Old users who registered their cards before this date still get the 5Euro tariff. For the rest, it has lost so much value it's not even worth talking about any more. It is now 17,99 for 1GB. That coupled with useless customer service muppets, means Simyo is now officially a terrible choice for travellers. (Unless of course you still have one of the old SIM's).

Also, I know this is an old thread but it's been a while since I've been back to this thread as I have been quite tied up. However, I've just read some of the posts above, and wanted to post in order to set the record of this thread straight on something and confirm what Inquisitor has been saying above.

Firstly, it is completely untrue that Simyo is a GPRS only service. It uses Orange, and it all depends on whether you can get Orange UMTS coverage where you are located or not. Until recently, I have been using high speed UMTS through Simyo for VoIP, maps and mobile browsing on a more or less daily basis. AFIK I have never been overcharged. I am only not using it now as I am temporarily outside of Spain.

I think user gaidal had a particularly bad experience, but it is not representative of the normal service. He admits his iPhone was set up on auto-email-retrieve every 15 minutes. Because of the high block size of 256k, Simyo is just not suited to this. For him 4 tiny connections will already be 1MB, even though the real data transmitted will be a few kilobytes!

pete_l · 20-02-2010, 15:56

Quote:

Here's the killer. The data link is GPRS only

Update: Jan 2010. It turns out there's an extra field needed in the dongle initilaisation. From memory, it's *99# (though don't quote me, it's close but probably not that EXACT string) which turns on 3G / HSDPA mode. With this inserted, the dongle flies - sometimes.

petkow · 20-02-2010, 16:50

Strange. What dongle are you finally using? What firmware/software does it have? Normally there is no need at all to activate HSDPA on any 3G Modem.

Weren't you previously tethering your GPRS-only phone to a PC? You mentioned above that none of your UK based dongles worked. I assume you bought another one then?

It's unfortunate that you seem to be having all these problems, which seem so unrepresentative of my experiences. In my case, I just popped a Simyo SIM into a cheap E169 (bought in an o2 shop in the UK) and was on the internet in minutes. The only change I did was to reflash the device to get rid of the o2 software and instead made it run the original "Mobile Partner" software. Then I put the "gprs-service.com" APN in, and I had HSDPA speeds straight away! I also have it running on my 3G phone at times. Still high speed!

inquisitor · 15-06-2011, 10:33

Is anyone of you aware of a USSD-code (e.g. *100#) to check the remaining credit of a simyo SIM?

jaaho · 01-07-2011, 20:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by inquisitor

Is anyone of you aware of a USSD-code (e.g. *100#) to check the remaining credit of a simyo SIM?

To check the remaining credit of a simyo SIM press *111#

Lucy · 27-06-2011, 21:13

I'll be in Spain for just a week, at hotels, and will likely not be at a place when the delivery arrives to sign and show passport.

So what is the second best to Simyo? Something readily available in shops. I'll be traveling with someone so we will both get sims and a large part of our calls will be to each other.

I noticed Eroski Movil and Pepephone as possibilities.

	(#1)
gaidal (Offline) Junior Member Newbie Posts: 3 Join Date: 23 Dec 2009 Country:	23-12-2009, 02:57 I'd like to warn everyone against this one. Firstly, as the previous poster said it seems to be gprs only and is pretty slow, although I do get a 3G symbol outdoors. But that's not what makes me disappointed because if you look closely it doesn't say anything about speed for the €5 plan, only the €24.99 one. I've had it for 5 days on my iPhone and used 20 + 4 mb (down + up), and for this they've charged me €6.11! The tariff on the website that sounds so good isn't what they're actually using, they charge for every connection up to at least €0.99 + tax or more per day, even if I'm only using 1 mb in total. This wouldn't have mattered if it actually stopped at €5 but it doesn't. I had a Spanish speaking friend call the customer service, the first two times to find out if they meant €5 maximum per day or per month, and the first and second person told her different things. The third time was a few days later, to find out why they charge me so much: They clearly tried to talk themselves out of it, letting her talk to different people, having her wait, and in between giving random explanations that were a joke, such as "look at this session at this date and time, you got it for free because you had reached the limit right?" or "well this plan is not meant for downloading, only for simple stuff like checking your e-mail, it might be better if you don't use it a lot...". As I said I had only used 20 mb down in 5 days. Do they think it's still 1999 or what? When we threatened to report them to a consumer rights organization they finally said that they would look into it (after 30 min) but didn't offer anything immediately, not even a reference number until my friend demanded it. What a customer service, it's like the wild west. :P It's kind of sad isn't it, because simyo's 500 mb for €5 would have been the cheapest Spanish data plan by far, had it been true! Or has anyone had it work for them?

	(#2)
laptopnomad (Offline) Junior Member Amateur Member Posts: 23 Join Date: 16 Oct 2009 Location: Asia & The Middle-East Country:	28-12-2009, 15:09 Thanks so much for sharing! I can relate to the experience - not getting to what's being promised and then trying to work a local helpdesk to get the truth out. As i experienced so many times, DATA plans are not understood well enough by local helpdesks. As it seems to me Simyo has several problems to solve here. Foremost education & training of the helpdesk. Because the 500Mb was way to small for me, I choose Yoigo - so far so good - knock on wood. It gives me 3.1Gb of 3G for € 93,- (ex tax) a month with a daily limit of 100 Mb - after which speeds drops to GPRS alike. It's not the cheapest I know. So a bit of my helpdesk experience: Yoigo has AFAIK three English speaking operators - all 3 know the DATA plan well enough to help Internet savvy heavy users. Their e-mail response in English is within 36 hours. And yes, there are (rural) parts of Spain that are still GPRS only, of course depending on the cellphone network. I got a few as well. So this place PrePaidGSM is the only place I know where to get a bit of feedback on the actual quality of 3G operators. It's not all about the price IMHO, also the (underlying) network and the people who run the helpdesk. My biggest problem was to get what i wanted in the local phone shop in a language i don't speak. Here's my experience. The Laptop Junction Overland by 4x4 truck in Asia, Middle-East and Afrika

	(#5)
petkow (Offline) Senior Member Prepaid Pioneer Posts: 696 Join Date: 01 Aug 2006 Location: Madrid Country:	18-02-2010, 13:17 Simyo have changed tariff since 4th Feb. Old users who registered their cards before this date still get the 5Euro tariff. For the rest, it has lost so much value it's not even worth talking about any more. It is now 17,99 for 1GB. That coupled with useless customer service muppets, means Simyo is now officially a terrible choice for travellers. (Unless of course you still have one of the old SIM's). Also, I know this is an old thread but it's been a while since I've been back to this thread as I have been quite tied up. However, I've just read some of the posts above, and wanted to post in order to set the record of this thread straight on something and confirm what Inquisitor has been saying above. Firstly, it is completely untrue that Simyo is a GPRS only service. It uses Orange, and it all depends on whether you can get Orange UMTS coverage where you are located or not. Until recently, I have been using high speed UMTS through Simyo for VoIP, maps and mobile browsing on a more or less daily basis. AFIK I have never been overcharged. I am only not using it now as I am temporarily outside of Spain. I think user gaidal had a particularly bad experience, but it is not representative of the normal service. He admits his iPhone was set up on auto-email-retrieve every 15 minutes. Because of the high block size of 256k, Simyo is just not suited to this. For him 4 tiny connections will already be 1MB, even though the real data transmitted will be a few kilobytes!

	(#7)
petkow (Offline) Senior Member Prepaid Pioneer Posts: 696 Join Date: 01 Aug 2006 Location: Madrid Country:	20-02-2010, 16:50 Strange. What dongle are you finally using? What firmware/software does it have? Normally there is no need at all to activate HSDPA on any 3G Modem. Weren't you previously tethering your GPRS-only phone to a PC? You mentioned above that none of your UK based dongles worked. I assume you bought another one then? It's unfortunate that you seem to be having all these problems, which seem so unrepresentative of my experiences. In my case, I just popped a Simyo SIM into a cheap E169 (bought in an o2 shop in the UK) and was on the internet in minutes. The only change I did was to reflash the device to get rid of the o2 software and instead made it run the original "Mobile Partner" software. Then I put the "gprs-service.com" APN in, and I had HSDPA speeds straight away! I also have it running on my 3G phone at times. Still high speed!

	(#8)
inquisitor (Offline) Senior Member Prepaid Professionist Posts: 1,399 Join Date: 15 Nov 2006 Country:	15-06-2011, 10:33 Is anyone of you aware of a USSD-code (e.g. 100#) to check the remaining credit of a simyo SIM? terminals:* Samsung: Galaxy S5 DuoS (G900FD); BLU: Win HD LTE; Nokia: 1200; Asus: Fonepad 7 ME372CG; Huawei data: E3372, Vodafone R201, K3765, E1762; postpaid: O2 on Business XL; prepaid: DE: Aldi Talk, Lidl; UK: 3; BG: MTel, vivacom; RU: MTS; RS: MTS; UAE: du Tourist SIM; INT'L: toggle mobile VoIP: sipgate.de (German DID); sipgate.co.uk (British DID); ukddi.com (British DID); sipcall.ch (Swiss DID); megafon.bg (Bulgarian DID); InterVoip.com

	(#10)
Lucy (Offline) Member Official Member Posts: 30 Join Date: 28 Jun 2009 Country:	27-06-2011, 21:13 I'll be in Spain for just a week, at hotels, and will likely not be at a place when the delivery arrives to sign and show passport. So what is the second best to Simyo? Something readily available in shops. I'll be traveling with someone so we will both get sims and a large part of our calls will be to each other. I noticed Eroski Movil and Pepephone as possibilities.