We will be travelling in Italy and Paris next month. We need to stay in touch with my sister in the states who will be taking care of our business while we're gone.

I'm thinking we need an international calling card. Do we buy it over there? But what about her needing to contact us? Most of our hotels have internet access, so I guess we could rely on email. I guess we could buy her a card for calling TO Europe, but she would still be limited to catching us at the hotel.

I apologize if this is obtuse. I really don't know much about this or how it works.

J

Until very recently I always bought calling cards in Europe and called home periodically to make sure everything is OK. Now I have a cell phone that works in Europe. I cannot tell you what a load off my mind it is to know that the people at home can get in touch with me if an emergency should arise.

Sorry, I hit post before I finished my thought. Email is good for non-emergency communication and it's less expensive. But if someone needs to get in touch with you right away, it's good to know that they can reach you by phone.

I don't think we have the right kind of phone...don't you need GSM, or something like that?

I'll probably rely on email, phone cards going both ways, letting my sister call our hotel if she needs us. Where does one buy these cards?

JeanneB, why not review what Sharkmom did to stay in touch with her office, ie, skype? I remember thinking it was a very well conceived plan for staying in touch daily. My Dartmouth son has urged me to get skype, but I just don't feel inclined. We are headed out in January to Italy and Paris also, but we don't have the pressing need to stay in daily contact, although we have kiddos in different colleges. We followed Ira's suggestion and obtained a cell phone from Mobal (? I believe that is it-my husband secured it, so I could be wrong) that works only in Europe. The minute charges are high, but as an off-set, so is the dependability.

Have a swell trip, and let us know how it goes.

In 2004, we rented a cell phone thru Verizon. My DH had a new job and my mom was having surgery, so I didn't want to be without a cell phone.
It ended up costing us about $200 total. We had to give a $200 deposit on the phone, but ended up using $200 worth of calls, so we just didn't get our deposit back.
They fed ex-ed it to us a week before we left, and then I fed exed it back.
I have heard that phone cards are cheaper, so I am curious how that works if anyone knows.

Here is my advice taking into consideration it is the 21st century and times change...

1. Go to ebay or some internet seller and purchase an unlocked gsm dual band (900,1800) phone. Models such as the Nokia 1100 run to about $75.

2. Go to www.united-mobile.com and purchase a united mobile prepaid sim card for €39 including shipping to the US. You will have €15 of credit.

3. You will then know your united mobile phone number which will be a Liechtenstein phone number (423 country code).

4. Once you know that, go to www.enlinea.com, open up an account with enlinea. It is a call back service that allows you tomake calls on your united-mobile phone for 12¢/minute US from anywhere in Europe to the United States all calls timed in 6 second intervals (talk for 65 seconds and you pay for 11 units of 6 seconds not for 2 minutes as many other carriers charge you)....you will then be able to get through enlinea a US 800 number which you can give to your families and friends so they can reach you 24/7...cost to them is free cost to you is 12¢/minute timed as above.

Now I must report some have reported trouble with enlinea from time to time, it seems to be working okay now.

However, they can also reach you directly on the Liechtestein number paying whatever their long distance carrier charges for a call to Liechtenstein (watch out about this it varies widely from as little as 11¢ to as much as $1.49 /minute. Also you can use the naitive call functioning of united-mobile which is €0,39/minute timed in 1 minute intervals for calls from anywhere in Western Europe (you're going to Italy and France right) plus a €0,25 set up fee. Calls you receive are and will be free...

You could also get a French and/or Italian sim once you get there. If going to Italy first, Italian mobile phone prices are very low and the phones are generally unlocked...my friend got a Siemens phone dual band for about €29....the catch there is that in the other country (France) roaming on the Italian carrier will be fairly expensive and French sim prices are no bargain....or maybe both and use the enlinea number and switch it (a quick e mail will do that) from the Italian sim to the United-Mobile sim.

I know very complicated...well not as bad as it looks and after all this is the 21st century.

Country specific calling cards are cheaper but you lose the ability to be reachable 24/7 which is the nice thing about mobile (the term used in Europe) phones.

That's what I would do but I admit I have a great deal of expertise on this subject and some know nothings might try to divert you from the excellent suggestions above with the stupid remark that it is too complicated.

Trust me, as others have discovered and said on this board, there is nothing like having your own mobile phone in Europe to be reachable 24/7 and there are so many alternatives and more are coming to make it almost mind boggling.

But whatever you do, don't throw away money and rent from verizon. It's really not a good deal and verizon is most assuredly not a GSM provider...

I travel frequently and have family in serveral continents. My regular cell is a quad band and my monthly basic charge is $25 for 300 mins free weekends and pms. However, this does not cover any Intl calls. As I use this phone only for emergencies (and for important business calls..someone else's dime)it is cheap (1 call in 2 years). Check with your local provider and consider this call if you are a freq traveller.

What about a pager? My sis could "beep" us, alerting me to call her (with the int'l calling card). Is Skytel still around? Gotta go do some Googling.

We have a quad band phone and cingular service. We activate the international feature with Cingular for $5.99/month when we travel. The calls are $.99/minute, so we buy an international phone card on arrival and use that for routine calls but have the cell so family can reach us if necessary.
We have had some family members with serious health problems and the cell really made us more comfortable knowing we could be reached in an emergency.

I second what Judy said. My daughter-in-law did the same thing: activate international service for one month for $5.99 and $1 a minute. Seems like the way to go if you already have a cell phone and don't plan on using a lot of minutes while you're in Europe.

T-Mobile is cheaper for international roaming services - no monthly fee and $0.99/min calls.

Or you could buy a phone from Mobal.com for $49 and pay $1.50-$2.00/minute for calls (charged to the credit card you used to buy the phone). No other fees, and can use the phone on future trips without having to 'activate' anything.
http://www.mobalrental.com/?source=0006DN07NMOBWEB

Buying a GSM phone and then local SIM cards is much much cheaper per-minute if you are going to have seriously frequent or long conversations.

It doesn't work for your emergencies, but I always have a "dedicated" e-mail that I use on trips. Everyone knows in my family that I can be reached at that e-mail address but they don't send "fun" stuff to it unless I ask. I save it for what must be communicated while I'm gone. When you are paying by the minute, it is nice to not have to fish through the fluff.

If you decide not to buy or rent a cell phone, even if you want to rely primarily on e-mail, this simple system has worked well for me:

Give the person at home the hotel numbers and have her use a 10-10-xxx dialaround service to make calls very inexpensively (typical charge might be 50 cents for the connection plus 10 cents a minute -- 10 minutes would be $1.50). She can leave a message for you to call back.

For yourself, buy an inexpensive phone card in the country(ies) you will be calling from. You should be able to find them at newsstands, etc., at a cost of less than $10 for several hours of transatlantic time.

Bon voyage.

A careful analysis of just what you want and/or expect is necessary before you can make the correct decision for you.

Prepaid country specific international calling cards are great for outgoing calls either at night from the hotel or if you can find and understand how to use a public phone. They are the cheapest way to go without question for outgoing.

Also if you want, for example, to have an emergency way to be contacted in a time of need or for example you are renting a car and want to have an emergency way of getting health, and your US carrier is GSM (probably either T Mobile or Cingular) and they have international plans which Cingular and T mobile do, then by all means you can use their international roaming services. But bear in mind, they are far overpriced charging 99¢/minute to both make and receive calls in Europe rounded up to the next minute. These 99¢ minutes quickly add up, one tem minute call is almost $10...and it's always frustrating to receive a call by accident (somebody mistakenly dials your number) and even if you recognize on the caller ID that you don't want to answer the call, you pay $1.98 for the call to flip back to voice mail. But for emergency use, it's not a big deal probably.

But if you want a real functioning mobile phone to be reachable 24/7, to be able to use a local calling card to call while sitting in a cafe eating lunch, to call a restaurant to make dinner reservations, to hook up with somebody you make arrangements to meet, I could go on and on, then having a real working mobile phone is, at least to me, the only way to go following the advice, excellent advice I might add, I gave earlier in the thread.

But it's your call and to ask for anybody's advice, you have to be clear as to just what you want to do, simply make a few calls home, be able to make a call in an emergency, or a phone for general use.

And, while it is a generalization, European acceptance of mobile phones is miles ahead of the USA although the USA is catching up in that regard, at least as to universal use of mobile phones. You see eight year old kids all the time in Europe walking around with mobile phones....because Europe is a collection of small countries, going from Holland to Germany is not a big deal. While in the USA our mobile phone plans are now all inclusive as to LD charges, you pay the same for a call from NYC or from LAX, a European teen ager living in Holland might have friends living in Germany. He would want besides his Dutch contract plan to have a German prepaid when visiting his friends as inter European roaming rates are extremely high; although because of some EU pressure companies such as Vodafone are beginning to lower their international roaming rates.

That is the nice thing about United-Mobile which was originally known as Riiing.

Also as with everything else, technology relentlessly marches on and what is great today might be obsolete six months from now (see computers) but what the hell...you stick your toe in the water and try it on for size.

Hope that helps.

&quot;...<i>But bear in mind, they are far overpriced charging 99¢/minute to both make and receive calls in Europe rounded up to the next minute. These 99¢ minutes quickly add up, one tem minute call is almost $10...&quot;</i>

We spent under $15 in charges per phone for our 9 day trip in Sept. Using France as an example, how much is the least expensive local SIM and how much does it cost to 'buy' 10 minutes of call time? (I think the SIM initially includes a minimal # of minutes or units). And how long do any unused paid minutes last before the SIM expires?

I think the local SIM route is good -if- you are truly going to use the phone a lot and often. I understand that you pay more to implement but you get far more in value if you need to use the phone that much. Otherwise, I don't think you can take this route for less than $15 a trip.

We are researching a similar question for our daughter who will study in Italy next semester. Her school recommends a company called Piccell Wireless. They 'rent' the phone, some are 'free' rental, international minutes look reasonable, calls within Italy are free-- at least that's what I've been told. I haven't done the research myself yet, but will in the next couple of days.
We'll also download skype to keep in touch via internet calls with her.

I always get by with using email at public internet cafes. I've yet to have a problem finding a convenient one. I'm not sure from your post if you absolutely need to make telephone calls, or if this might work for you too.

Another plus for email is you don't have to worry about the time difference like for a phone call.

As of this moment, French prepaid SIM's are not a very good buy....check out the rates on www.prepaidgsm.net and you will find very high rates for local calls (although you can get limited breaks nights and weekends) the starter packs run about &euro;30 with &euro;10 of credit and they expire pretty quickly....with a &euro;20 top up you buy besides the call credit, 2 months of validity after which unused credits expire and an additional 6 months during which the sim remains valid and can be recharged and can be used for receiving calls while in France for free.

Bear a couple of things in mind when talking about prepaid local sims in Europe.

1. Receiving calls will always be free to the recipient of the calls while in the country of origin. Thus with a French prepaid sim, while in France, the recipient pays nothing; however the caller pays a surcharge. If you ever look at international ld rates of AT&amp;T they advertise very low rates to call say France, something in the vicinity of 12¢/minute rounded up to the next minute but an examination of the fine print will show you there is a 22¢/minute surcharge to call a French mobile. This goes with the European idea that caller pays...the same thing would be true in Italy with an Italian prepaid sim...while in Italy the recipient pays nothing but the caller pays a surcharge.

Now that's where riiing oops united mobile paired with enlinea comes in...you pay nothing to receive calls anywhere in Western Europe (except Liechtenstein itself where it's 0,19&euro;/minute rounded up)....

Calls using united mobile can be made and rates were listed in my original post or you can get them on the web site www.united-mobile.com....calls to united-mobile are charged as calls to Liechtenstein wherever you are (you could be in China BTW) and as noted, at least on US ld carriers, vary very very widely from a low of 11¢/minute to as much as $1.49/minute. But using the services of enlinea (www.enlinea.com) these rates can be lowered dramatically (really hate to be repetitive but many are unfamiliar with all this stuff)....but the caveat or the downer is enlinea has not been completely reliable. When it's working which is most of the time, it's great. But there have been blocs of time where it has been down.

So unless you're going to be in France for a lengthy block of time, prepaid sims in France might not be a great idea, I highly recommend them in Italy and the UK however.

BTW recently the French government has initiated anti trust violations against the French mobile companies with hefty fines...this might lead to an upcoming dropping of the rates but stay tuned on that one.