We are 10 travelling in 3 cars to our reunion in Strachocina. I think we may need a way to communicate? I am heading over to T mobile (Columbus,OHIO)tomorrow to see what they have available. I curently have Verizon so no luck there. My husband has sprint -nextel Could I use his phone? Any Ideas are helpful.
We may just buy a couple of phones in Warsaw? But, my cousin rented a phone in Paris and ended up with >$1000.00US in charges for very few calls. If I find the name of that company I will post it with a warning.
Thanks bunches!
Sun

search this forum on Unlocked phone ... with unlocked (and your phone needs to be gsm quad or at least cover right band for europe - your service provider will give you this info.) you can just buy pre-paid sim card in Poland and use your own phone ... other options will be more expensive... Another options is renting phone from car company (many offer that) but again you really need to compare rates if that be cheaper then what your local company offers ... sim cards are definitly cheapest alternative and available all over - but you need to verify your hardware ...

As for real need ... I think with some planning and appropriate check points you should not really need a phone ...

also do not buy any electronics (phones included) in Poland where you will pay at least 50% more then in USA ... if you existing phone is not gsm with the right bands - check ebay for for cheap unlocked gsm quad or ask your service provider for maybe an exchange ;-) ...

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34986045

I checked at t-mobile today. They have a $60.00 pre-paid phone that will work in Poland. I will just need a sim card when I get there.

Thanks for the posts

Sun

After a long conversation with the sale rep at T-Mobile I purchased the triband phone (pre-paid minutes) for $64.00. He gave me all the info about sim cards and which company to use that will work with the phone since we are travelling next week. I called today to get the phone unlocked. T-mobile said they do not unlock their phones unless you have been their customer for 90 days and have added a specific amount of minutes. I pleaded my case the best I could, but I think the sales rep mis-represented the phone as something I could use next week. I can send it to another company for another $25.00 plus shipping to unlock it over-night. They cannot remotly unlock this phone. So, an idea that should have been easy has become very difficult. I hope this doesnot happen to you.

Thanks,
Sun

here is the end of this story...I hope.
T-mobile denied my request to unlock the phone. So, I gave it to my good friend with T-mobile service. She was able to work with customer service to unlock the phone. This was only because she was a long term customer in good standing. It is good to have friends.
Sun

The agony continues... we could not get the phone unlocked. Also, The web sites that unlock phones are unable to unlock this one...going back to the store tomorrow.
sun

We are back from Poland and Prague!The phone I purchased from T-mobile could not be unlocked. The phone purchased "unlocked" over the internet did not work. The phone from T-Mobile that my friend had unlocked did work. (she is a long time customer)
what we ended up doing was ... found an ERA store. (there is one just down from the centrum and Nowy Swiat.in Warsaw, easy walk from the Bristol) We purchased 2 $50.00US phones from ERA. Also a sim card for the unlocked T-mobile phone. The cingular phone the other couple with us also worked. This saved us. with such a large group, long drives, several cars. No one got lost. The purchase was worth it. We just added minutes when needed. One more thing, in Prague, I could not find a place or card to top off the phone. There might have been a place near the Powder Tower? but, never found it.
Hope this all helps the next person.

Safe travels,
Sun

The only thing I don't understand in your tale of woe is why the phone you purchased over the internet unlocked didn't work...I suspect I know the answer...just out of curiosity was it an American tri band phone? See the problem is the frequency issue...because of the contrary minded US frequency use, US tri bands usually come with the following 3 frequencies: 850/1800/1900....often times especially with Nokia the US tri band model and the real world wide tri band (900/1800/1900) have the same model numbers and even the vendors don't really understand the difference.

In many countries in Europe, if you are roaming say with a US sim card, it doesn't matter as the phone will seek out and fine a service which operates on 1800 but many carriers use only the 900 frequency and I have seen this happen quite often namely a person with a US tri band buys a sim card of a company which is predominantly 900 and the phone is unable to register...happens a lot. If the phone has the proper frequency and is unlocked it will most assuredly register on the network.

As far as topping up a Polish sim card in the Czech Republic, that also is in accordance with what is. In general (unless you are using a company such as Vodafone which allows use of top u vouchers of any other vodafone network in the country you are visiting, you cannot top up once you leave the country of the sim card. In most cases you can't even use a credit card on the web site to top up as the web site is not always accessible in English and most only allow local credit cards to be used to top up.

Anyway glad everything did work out in the end and I'm sure you valued the ability to communicate with each other with such a large group.