Has anyone purchased a cell phone and French SIM card from the Roam Simple company? If so, are/were you satisfied with their Motorola V180 phone and their direct billing of your credit card for each call?

Yes, the price is right and very satisfied. I will be taking it with me on 4/15...........

d_c_b,

Could you explain how this works? If you purchase a phone and SIM, do you need to then pay again for calls? Is the SIM card not "loaded" with minutes? Or does the SIM just "activate" the phone, and the minutes are billed separately?

MP

Phone is $40, if you want one. SIM is $9 for it, or any unlocked GSM phone.

Incomeing calls free, within France .55, to US .69.

they will bill you monthly for calls you ahve made...

gracejoan3--Have you used the phone in Europe (or some other non-USA place) yet?

The costs are correct, as per their web site. There is a $15 delivery charge. The Motorola V180 phone is unlocked (but reconditioned!) so if you decide there is a better deal in some country, you can use a SIM card from another vendor.

I have an e-mail from them today stating that prices will go up in a few weeks. I don't know by how much.

I'm wondering how it would comapre to buying a SIM card from a local french company.

There may be cheaper ways to do this
Michel, such as buying a card at one's destination...

I bought a similar deal from CallinEurope last week. For me the
advantage is it is ready to go when
I arrive in Athens in May and I don't need to worry about finding a local SIM card. Probably not such a big deal but something I'd rather not deal with after spending 12 hours or whatever in a plane from Montreal.

Further things that I found useful are that I can forward calls from my regular cell phone here in Canada to the GSM phone in Europe for a small fee. Plus the number (which is French) stays good and does not expire. I get billed for calls on my
credit card so don't have to worry about running out of calling credits at an inopportune time.

For 60 bucks delivered it seemed
worthwhile to me.

Rob

If you do the Roam Simple, as I have...phone and SIM you are ready to go when you land. I have my France phone number, will be CC billed, as above. I wouldn't spend the time after arrival. It couldn't be simpler!!

Does the number expire after the trip?

CallinEurope's number does not expire
and there are no charges until one uses the phone again.

Rob

This sounds really good- Too good? If I purchase just the SIM for my 4 band US phone, I pop the SIM in and have amazing rates while traveling in France?

According to their site you'd pay them
$29 for the SIM and get calls in France, Europe and Canada/US for 39 cents a minute.

http://preview.tinyurl.com/36zt8n

OK. Here's a service for free calls:

http://www.talkster.com/HowItWorks.aspx

just go to the www.roamsimple.com site and it tells you the cost of the SIM onlu, or with a phone. You can pull up the rates for whateveer country etc..it is all there...

Rob,

Have you used the callineurope service? Can you recommend it?

Thanks!

RueChapon,

No, I haven't used it yet. I will
have it with me in Greece May 2-12.

If you're not in a rush, I'll let you
know how it goes.

Rob

From what I see:

MULTI-COUNTRY WORLD CARD:
-free incoming applies ONLY while you are in the UK (it's a UK SIM and phone number)

- the service is valid for 12 months
- incoming call rates (vary by location) are $1.29-$3.49
- outgoing calls (local and other countries) are $1.29-$3.49 as well

SINGLE COUNTRY CARD:
- free incoming
- outgoing calls $0.59 same country; $0.79 to US; $1.49 other countries
- the service is valid for 12 months

COMPARE TO MOBAL Phone service:
- Mobal rates are slightly less than the above "World" card, $1.25-2.95
- Mobal never expires
- Mobal does not have the equivalent of the single country SIM or rates
- s/h is $10

Roam Simple small print:
- automatic annual 'renewal fee' of $9; Mobal does not have this

I have both a Mabal phone and a Roam Simple.

The Mobal has an Estonian phone number!! Calls are all higher. No one is going to want to call you because of the rates that they will pay..such as a restaurant calling you back or friends in the area....

The Roam Simple phone is an unlocked "quad" and has a France SIM...much bedtter, all the way around. I think most people can afford the $9.00 annual fee....75 cents per month!!

I did a little 'cost analysis' between the two, based on our typical phone usage while traveling. If I only ever wanted to visit one country, then the Roam S. phone would be cheaper, even with maintaining the phone number at $9. every year. But when you go to 3 countries over 12 months, it won't make sense to get 3 different country SIMs, espec if you want to keep one of them active for the next time you go there. And the rates for the 'Europe' and 'World' sims are less favorable and no less $$ when the $9. is factored back in as a 'per minute' charge so as to be comparable to Mobal, which has no such 'renewal' fee. So I'll keep the Mobal until such time as we 'settle into' one country going forward.