In order to help answer the large amount of questions about what provider to use when coming to the UK, I will post the price & phone info offered by Virgin Mobile UK as they are the cheapest and easiest provider to use for visitors coming to the UK.

First off, Virgin is all about prepaid services. They have no yearly contracts but what they do offer is a pay monthly basis where you pay for all of your calls at the end of the month through a UK credit/debit card bank account.

Or of course, you can also use the conventional system of top up cards which come in denominations of £10 and £20. The amount you top up remains active on your account for over a year. In terms of rates/charges, Virgin breaks down like this:

Calls

First 5 minutes of calls per day: 15p/per minute
Each minute after that for the rest of the day: 5p/per minute
SMS to other Virgin Mobile UK customers: 3p/per message
WAP: Same as standard call charges

Voicemail: Free Retrieval (you must have calling credit on your account though)

Calls to other UK networks: 35p/per minute
SMS to other UK networks: 10p/per message

International Calls

Ireland, Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man: 15p/per minute
USA, Canada, Australia & New Zealand: 20p/per minute
Europe, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan: 40p/per minute
Rest of the world: 80p/per minute

International SMS: 20p/per message (even when sending extended/multiple SMS over 160 characters which will be sent as separate messages and then charged at 20p each with every 160 character interval)

You can get the Virgin Mobile SIM for £9.99 (includes £5 of free calls to get you started) and refill cards at any UK cell retailer like The Carphone Warehouse, Phones4U, The Link and Dixon's. All SIM starter kits, phones and top up cards are also available at any Virgin Megastore/Virgin Megastore Express location in the UK.

As of December 6th, 2003, Virgin has the following phones in their lineup (include the SIM):

Alcatel 332 (GSM 900/1800): £49.99
Motorola C200 (GSM 900/1800): £49.99
Nokia 3310 (GSM 900/1800): £59.99
Motorola C350 (GSM 900/1800): £59.99
Nokia 3410 (GSM 900/1800): £69.99
Sagem myX-5 (GSM 900/1800): £69.99
Sendo M550 (GSM 900/1800): £79.99
Nokia 3510i (GSM 900/1800): £79.99
Samsung C100 (GSM 900/1800) £79.99
Panasonic G50 (GSM 900/1800/1900): £99.99
Samsung A800 (GSM 900/1800): £109.99
Nokia 3100 (GSM 900/1800/1900): £119.99
Alcatel 735 (GSM 900/1800): £129.99
Samsung E400 (GSM 900/1800/1900): £179.99
Nokia 6100 (GSM 900/1800/1900): £179.99
Nokia 3300 (GSM 900/1800): £199.99
Nokia N-Gage (GSM 900/1800/1900): £219.99
Siemens SL55 (GSM 900/1800/1900): £309.99

The phone list and prices may change over time as Virgin Mobile adds more to their selection. You can get more updates at:

http://www.virginmobile.com/mobile/index.jsp

I will update this thread once more info becomes available, please post any questions below.

Thank you

Nice work, TB.

Another possibly useful bit of info is that your number will stay active for 6 months from when it was last used.

Speaking of which, I need to schedule a trip

Thanks carlo . When are you coming back out here?

Hello Tri Band

Looks like you have started the perfect thread for me.

I'm off to the UK later this month for the holiday period. Whilst there Im picking up a new Sony P900.

Im mostly interested in getting WAP access whilst Im there - having never used it before (and Im an internet developer shame on me) Im curious if Virgin offer this service with their pre paid plans.

If not do you have any suggestions, Im not bothered by expense but want to really use all the features of the phone before I return home (small island in the caribbean) and lose a lot of the functionality.

Thanks

Adam

Yes you will definitely have WAP access on Virgin Mobile but it would be via CSD (dial-up) only. Virgin Mobile does not support packet connections (which means an always on connection) like GPRS. In terms of the P900, I've heard and read a lot of great things about it but given its expense, it is well out of my price range.

My advice would to check out Sony Ericsson's website as well as the Sony Ericsson and the UIQ (the version of Symbian OS (OS meaning operating system) the P900 runs on like the P800) here on Howard's Forums:

Regular Sony Ericsson Forum: http://sonyericsson.howardforums.com

UIQ Forum (you'll find most of the P800 and P900 users in here)
http://uiq.howardforums.com

Feel free to ask any more questions.......

Welcome on board here at Howard's Forums

Thanks a lot I'll check out the forum.

Have a great holiday (Chelsea I see, I was born in St Stephens on the Fulham road).

Thanks Again!

No problem, I'm finishing my American college degree (by May of next year) here in London at Webster University from St. Louis in Missouri and they have a London campus at Regent's College on the Inner Circle of Regent's Park. I live just off the King's Road, it's a great neighborhood, there's always a lot going on here .

To get back to the topic, I would seriously look at Virgin Mobile but make sure that they meet your needs before going with them.

You are incredibly helpful...thank you so much.

any idea where i can order one that can deliver to the US? I want to get all of my numbers in there and get my 6100 unlocked before I leave.

oh yea, and i would like to pick up a UK charger for it as well...hopefully from the same place to save shipping.

If you try to get the service pack delivered to the US, you will pay an arm and a leg. The companies that provide foreign SIM packs in the US triple the price you would pay if you wait.

No problem but I would just get all of that here in the UK. Like Jeff said, you'll save quite a bit of money. If you're flying into Heathrow, you'll find a couple of Carphone Warehouse locations right at the airport. I just don't know if their prices are higher since they're at the airport.

Cheers

Virgin Prepaid now allows you to roam internationally as well.

http://www.virginmobile.com/mobile/...ff_coverage.jsp

only a few places , but more coming including the US. I'll be landing at Heathrow at the weekend, so I'll be checking out prepaids as I let my UK postpaid go a while back.

I'm driving 4000 miles from London to Gambia in West Africa ! Looks like I need a bunch of sims to keep me connected along the way.

Just checked the web site...nice new treat for Virgin Mobile companies; however...

Once you leave the UK for any place in Europe, roaming rates when coverted from UK£ to US$ is more expensive than using T-mobile roaming especially in making calls. Perhaps the only advantage is receiving calls might be timed to the second although the web site is not clear on that while T mobile rounds up to the next minute!

So if you're planning a long visit to one country (long defined anything from a week more) your best bet is a prepaid plan in that country. If you're on one of those if it's Tuesday it must be Belgium type itineraries and you have T Mobile US service, your best bet might be to use them for international roaming at 99 cents/minute to both make and receive calls (Virgin Mobile lists its receiving rate in Europe as 60p a minute which at today's exchange rate is $1.05/minute.

thanks jeff and triband...looks like that's what i'll have to do.

One more question for you though:
If I get a virgin sim pack in the UK and for arguments sake let's say I go over to Italy for a weekend, is my phone going to work? WIll the rate be inflated? Will I still be able to receive free incoming?

Triband: my friend and I will be arriving on the 22nd or 23rd of January... are you in or around Oxford? It'll be cool to meet up with someone from the area to get us acquainted with England if you're willing.

The answer to your first question would be to check the roaming link Jeff posted and see if Italy is on the list for Prepaid Roaming. If Italy is on that list, then you can roam but both incoming calls and outgoing calls will be more expensive. It also depends on which Italian network you roam on as each provider sets different rates for people roaming on theit network.

Your phone will work as long it has GSM 900/1800 and it is unlocked meaning that it will accept another provider's SIM card. You can find out if the phone is unlocked by putting in a SIM card other than a SIM from your provider. If your phone displays anything like Invalid SIM or Enter Unlock Code, then that means that it is locked.

In regards to your 2nd question. I am not sure yet whether I'll be back just then. I might fly back from Northern Cali on the 21st. I'm in Central London so if you're coming here first, I'll be glad to meet up with you. I'll be able to tell you in a couple weeks once I know my return date (probably 1st week of January or so).

What can you tell me about Virgin Mobile's coverage, particularly in the Lake District and the Cotswolds?