Trouble with Cellular Abroad?
 

I rented one of their international phones for a trip last week to Flanders and Amsterdam and was very disappointed at the end of my trip. The good service in Flanders stopped as soon as I got to Amsterdam. Following the identical instructions for making calls, I was unable to call anyone in Holland, anyone in the U.S., not even the Cellular Abroad help number. They were very slow in responding to emails, completely unapologetic, and I felt ripped off after having put more money onto the phone just for my time in Amsterdam.

Has this happened to anyone else with Cellular Abroad, and it you gave up on theem, what other service did you try?

Thanks.

I think a lot of Americans buy an unlocked quad band phone and a local SIM when in Europe.

I can't answer your query re Celleular Abroad and why it wouldn't work in Amsterdam though. Which network did it use?
What instruction did you have for making calls?

I had the instructions they gave me which were supposed to work in both countries. I followed them to the letter (or, to the number) in Belgium and in Holland. They only worked in one country.

Did you actually have a signal? If not then there was clearly a network problem. If you had a signal then that would suggest a problem with the dialling instructions they gave you.
I would get back to them again and complain depending on which was the case.
Next time look for a cheap unlocked phone on e-bay or somewhere and buy a prepaid SIM on arrival in Europe. It will almost certainly work out cheaper too.

As the president of Cellular Abroad, I apologize for the experience that you had. Quite honestly, it doesn't make much sense for the service to just stop working. My immediate reaction is that you didn't have call credit but you mentioned that you added funds. If there was adequate credit and you are sure that you were dialing correctly, there could be other possible, albeit rare, issues. For example, the SIM card could have been jarred loose, you could have been in an area with no coverage (unlikely in Amsterdam unless you were holed up in a bunker the entire time), there could have been a temporary issue with the carrier or the phone could have gone kaput. Circumstances like your are very rare and typically they are attributable to misdialing or lack of call credit.

In any event, if you see this message, contact support at Cellular Abroad and have them forward your email to me and I will get a courtesy SIM or phone for your next trip. We have been in business since 2002 and have over 300,000 customers. We strive for perfection which, given the business we are in is not an easy goal but one that will always be the foundation of our philosophy.