I am travelling for business to BOM, BLR and DEL. I have some questions I am hoping people can help me answer as it is getting close to crunch time and I am a novice!!!

* I know my Cingular BBerry will work and the phone will work as well but what are my alternatives as Cingular's rates are ridiculous.

* Will I be able to coordinate a driver through the hotel concierge (m at the time of need or should I pre-arrange for days at a time?

* Will I be able to get an internet connection in my room at The Oberoi?

Thanks in advance for your help!
Mo

1. Are you sure that your BB will work in all three cities ? Make sure Cingular has roaming agreements with the BB carriers in each one.

2. If you are at the Oberoi in Mumbai, for example, there will be a fleet of cars that you can hire from at relatively short notice. No need for super advance booking.

3. The Oberois in the cities you are in should have hispeed - but check with the hotel first.

Buy a phone when you get to India - they are cheap. You won't get blackberry but you'll get connectivity. Skype is good for in the room.

The conceriege at a super hotel like the Oberoi will take care of you. Tell them you want an experienced driver with good English who can run errands for you. Tip the concierge 200 Rupees ($4) - he'll love you like a brother. The driver gets you to work and waits for you. He should be able to bring you lunch as company cafeterias are often not very safe for westerners: YMMV.

Tell your driver to get you a cell phone with a pre-paid SIM with good rates to the US. He'll mark it up a bit, take a kickback, and do the 2 hour chore.

My driver is awesome, I tip him 200 RS a day - that is 3x to 6x the going rate.

Have a great time - I LOVE India.

Yes, but the only alternative is to "go local", but that doesn't work for everyone or necessarily work easily if the data is more important than the voice aspect.

Yes, hotel can organize a driver. There are cheaper options but the hotel's arranged for transport works well too even if priced higher somewhat.

Yes, the Oberoi hotels have internet access.

Regarding Berry access in India, I know that Airtel offers Blackberry service. Its unclear from your post if having data is more important than Voice connectivity.

For voice, either buy a local pre-paid SIM to use in your berry or buy a phone locally. In either case, you can use the pre-paid SIM nationwide. At least with Airtel.

If you have a US unlocked quad band phone, you can drop an Airtel SIM into it and get going. The RAZR and most other quad band phones work.

See the Travel Technology forum on FT and search for India in the title of the post. There should be at least a half doz threads on the topic. A bit lazy right now.

All the above suggestions are good. Just a general point on getting referrals. This is a good idea, but be aware that you may occassionally feel like everyone is "on the take". Less of a problem at the bigger / more expensive hotels, but it is pretty frequent at more moderate hotels as well as with some drivers / taxis, etc.

They will pick up a "friend" who will "just happen" to be a tour guide / jewelry salesman / etc. They are harmless, but just be firm if you don't want to go to a particular store / restaurant / attraction that someone is steering you to because they are likely steering you there because they are getting a kickback.

If this is your first time going to India, suggest buying the book "Crash course to India" or something like that...on amazon.com

Staying at a SUPER hotel like Oberio means you will be treated like royalty...ask and ye shall receive...

just be prepeared for a lot of poverty and totally different customs....lots of traffic and humanity and so forth./..but it is a lot of fun and if you enjoy eating...the food is amazing...

Will a pre-paid SIM give me access to use my bberry for email as well? Or is it just for minutes used as a cell?

I guess my ultimate question is am I better off paying for internet everyday at the hotel or paying whatever it costs to have complete BBerry functionality?

MoCheex,
I haven't used berries in India. IIRC, the pre-paid option does not give you berry access. I might be wrong. You should post in the Travel Technology forum, folks there would have a better quality answer.

As for daily internet, you can pop into any of the Cafe Coffe Days (indian version of Starbucks) and get a one hour wifi access for about 50-60 INR. I don't know what the hotel will charge. But, getting internet access should be cheap.

My US T-Mobile Berry worked just fine in India (BOM,DEL & CCU). It will pick up whatever roaming partner cingular has in india and you should be fine. Note that depneding on your contract with cingular, you will pay roaming gprs data rates everytime your berry tries to connect with the server.

The SIM cards you may buy in india are primarily meant for talking (similar to the cingular go phone prepaid scheme) just sticking it into the berry doesn't mean you can use the same data functions. So if your company is not paying your phone costs, stick to using phones and check your mail using the internet. Wifi and broadband access is quite common in major indian cities.

my BB (T-Mobile) did not work in BOM as recent as June this month.

I was there last in July. My 7105 worked fine.

Have Cingular and GPRS was not available in DEL. Outside of DEL I was able to receive my e-mail. This trip was back in April so things might have changed by now.