We're going on four week European vacation. I usually use my Verizon company account when I travel to Europe on business and borrow one of our international phones with a SIM card that allows me to keep my office number. It's horrendously expensive but necessary on a business trip.

Now thanks to this forum I've decided to buy an unlocked Ericsson r520m for $85 and probably buy prepaid cards in Europe.

These are my questions. Will a card purchased in one EU country work in all the others. Is it cheaper to buy a domestic card and only use it domestically. Is the savings using a prepaid card only on intra European calls, or can I save significant amounts when I call the US.

My daughter expects to keep tabs on her boy friend. This alone would break me if I used Verizon.

Thanks for any help. This is a great forum.

BTW, since this phone is the size of a "house brick" I'll have my wife and daugher take turns carrying it. HA HA

I'd make your daughter and her boyfriend use a calling card from a regular phone, it's gonna be way less then cellular.

Yes (usually), yes (roaming charges on prepaids are horrendous, even intra-Europe), no (savings are mostly because incoming calls are free).

Other FT'ers have successfully combined prepaid SIM's (for incoming and local calls) with calling cards (for outgoing international calls from the cellphone), as described in some older threads. This would probably be the best combination of price and convenience.