vB Easy Archive - UK T-mobile prepaid vs Virgin

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UK T-mobile prepaid vs Virgin
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Posted by: sebastian86

I'm going to be in London for a month this summer. Which one's more worth it - T-Mobile or Virgin? Tariffs-wise it seems very similiar..

Posted by: JEFFJAGUAR

Right now today (it could be different tomorrow), T Mobile might be a better deal than Virgin especially (I assume you're in Canada since it says your provider is fido) if you are calling North America. T Mobile UK has an add on plan that enables you to buy 50 minutes of talk time to North America (USA and Canada) for £2.....my math tells me that is 4p/minute. Virgin charges 20p/minute to call North America....if everything else is the same, obviously T Mobile UK is the better deal.

Posted by: Jrott

Since Virgin roams on the T-Mobile network, coverage shound be the same (excellent) and the choice should be made on what will be cheapest for you. As Jeff pointed out, the T-Mobile rates to Canada are great. If you need a new T-Mobile sim cheap, PM me

Posted by: lozza

Since T-Mobile have changed their tarrifs last year - I'd say T-Mobile!

Posted by: Malkav

dunno virgin have free voice mail so if you miss a call due to either ya phone being off or your on the underground you can pick up the messages for free....

plus with a sim pack for £10. with £5. credit its a good deal imho!

Posted by: sebastian86

I actually expect to receive more calls than make calls. There's no like...unlimited incoming plan prepaid in the uk eh?

I think outgoing I plan on using skype and etc~

Posted by: JEFFJAGUAR

Actually, while in Europe you will find that with any local sim as long as you are in the country of origin of the sim, you will get 100% free reception of calls so for that it doesn't matter which UK sim card you get while in the UK....leave the UK however with a UK sim card and you pay through the nose, at least for the time being. But be aware your callers will pay a pretty stiff surcharge as the basic philosophy of European and other gsm carriers is caller pays.

There are also some sim cards you can get that will enable you to get free reception of calls throughout almost all of Europe.

Posted by: lozza

All UK plans come with unlimited incoming minutes. The caller will pay a premium above landline rates for calling a cellphone though.

It all depends how easily you can get a sim card. Coverage wise all carriers should be fine.

Posted by: lanwarrior

Mmmm.. I have T-MObile Pay-as-you-go and incoming calls are NOT free, so is Voicemail call.

Posted by: JEFFJAGUAR

Quote:

Originally Posted by lanwarrior

Mmmm.. I have T-MObile Pay-as-you-go and incoming calls are NOT free, so is Voicemail call.

In all due respect to you, if you have a T Mobile UK sim card and are in the UK, no matter if it's pay-as-you-go or contract...incoming calls are FREE.

Now if you are roaming with any other T Mobile sim card say T Mobile USA in the UK you will pay, and pay through your nose, to both make and receive calls.

Posted by: lanwarrior

Quote:

Originally Posted by JEFFJAGUAR

That's what I thought too. But when I got T-Mobile UK PAYG SIM card, there's nothing in the instruction booklet that says incoming calls are free. So I call T-Mo (dial 150) and they say incoming calls are NOT free. I got the PAYG SIM card in February 2007.

Posted by: JEFFJAGUAR

Quote:

Originally Posted by lanwarrior

Which only goes to show the hired help doesn't have a clue. Trust me....incoming calls on any UK gsm network are free while in the UK and T Mobile UK most assuredly falls under this statement.

Posted by: Malkav

seconded, no UK mobile network charges on direct dail incoming phone calls...none, not a single operator of mvno charges for this, zero, nada, zip, nota one'a!

Posted by: lanwarrior

Thanks for the info guys! So incoming calls are free, regardless whether the calls are coming from landline or another cellphone. I'll test it out tomorrow just for the heck of it, since I had issues with T-Mobile before. I.e. suddenly disabled HSDPA on my account with no reason. Yes, they're CS are quite dumb..

Posted by: mrcamp

There is nothing in the instruction booklet because that's just the way it works there and it has always been that way...incoming calls are free as long as you are in the sims native country period!

Quote:

Originally Posted by lanwarrior

Posted by: Malkav

go for the virgin pay as you go stays active longer....ahh go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on!

Posted by: psionandy

If you are planning on using gprs/3g then go for t-mobile.. they will cap your data costs at only £1 per day (VOIP is banned however

)

Posted by: telus_guy

How does the data cap work though? Does it mean you can't use more then 1 pound per day, or your cost is no more then 1 pound per day no matter how much data you use?

TG

Posted by: psionandy

Quote:

Originally Posted by telus_guy

How does the data cap work though? Does it mean you can't use more then 1 pound per day, or your cost is no more then 1 pound per day no matter how much data you use?

TG

If you use less than £1 of data.. you pay for it at the standard rate... If you use more than £1 of data.. then you only pay £1 for that day (midnight to midnight) and the fair use policy applies (which effectively limits you to a soft cap of 40mb a day

http://www.t-mobile.co.uk/eshop/per...s/payg-plans.do

If you're outside one of these deals the average price for data in the UK is about £2.50... so things get very expensive very quickly.

Quote:

Web'n'walk day pass
Compatible handset required. £1 maximum daily charge applies to U-Fix, Mates Rates, Everyone and Text Appeal customers. Roaming charges apply. Charges of 0.73p per KB apply until £1 per day (midnight to midnight) is spent. If you have already spent £1 and you browse for a continuous period from before midnight to after midnight, all of that period will be charged at the new day's rate of 0.73p per KB. Not applicable to connection via circuit switch data (CSD). Subject to coverage. *To ensure a high quality of service for all our customers a fair use policy of 40MB (of data both sent and received in the UK) per day applies. We monitor use on a monthly basis. If, in our reasonable opinion, you regularly exceed 40MB per day, we may tell you to reduce your future use. If you again regularly exceed 40 MB per day, we may tell you that we are going to apply network protection controls, resulting in a reduced network speed for 14 days. If you exceed 40 MB per day for a third time, we may tell you that we are going to apply further network protection controls, resulting in a permanently reduced network speed. We do not permit use of this service to provide modem access for a computer or for peer to peer file sharing, internet phone calls or instant messaging. Roaming charges apply.

Orange do a similar service.. but you have to activate it on a daily basis before you use it.. alternatively Orange will sell you 4mb for £4 which doesn't expire at midnight)

Posted by: cnlc

I'm flying to Uk and then going on to Czech Republic, Poland and Greece and then cruising back from Athens to London via Italy, France, Spain and Portugal.

Any reasonably priced prepaid that will allow me to receive free incoming in all or most of those countries and is relatively cheap to call back to Canada (where I am with Rogers).

Other option is just to get a calling card back to Canada if I can just get free incoming calls.

Posted by: mrcamp

I believe United Mobile covers most iif not all of those countries. You may want to post or read similar responses in the European and international forum here.

http://www.prepaidgsm.net/forum/

International sims.

http://www.prepaidgsm.net/en/international.html

Posted by: mwalsh

As mentioned previously, if you plan on going ANYWHERE other than the UK for any significant length of time then get a local SIM for the country you're visiting. You will pay through the nose for using your UK provider's SIM elsewhere in Europe. I seem to recall that Virgin was something like 55p a minute when I was in France. Plus there was no way to top up as I didn't have a UK credit card to register with Virgin and at the time they had recently pulled out of the French mobile market.

What I do these days is use a worldwide SIM. The Telestial Passport offers not great but not unreasonable rates for outgoing calls from most European countries, and free incoming calls in a great many of them.

Posted by: andy962

Quote:

Originally Posted by cnlc

I'm flying to Uk and then going on to Czech Republic, Poland and Greece and then cruising back from Athens to London via Italy, France, Spain and Portugal.

Any reasonably priced prepaid that will allow me to receive free incoming in all or most of those countries and is relatively cheap to call back to Canada (where I am with Rogers).

Other option is just to get a calling card back to Canada if I can just get free incoming calls.

For use from only the UK, the T-mobile bundle mentioned above

For Europe, as well as the global SIMs mentioned, also look at O2 UK's My Europe Extra. A £10 monthly fee gets free incoming calls in 31 other European countries, outgoing 25p/min. Then use separate callback for outgoing.

The callback firm ReturnCall has interesting rates (5p Canada), though I wouldn't rely on it as the only option. Voipcheap and Voipbuster have just introduced sms callback; VC rates from a UK/IoM mobile to 40 countries landlines are 8c/min. You might use a separate mobile Java client to send sms, such as mobisms, Voipbuster or Vyke; the last cheapest at 2c each