miizzles

If I buy prepaid SIM cards from Telestial (UK, Thailand, Singapore specifically), do I need to start using them within a specific time? Any hassles activating the cards or all done automatically?

SNA1K

I purchased a prepaid card from Telestial for China and I'm sure that there is no problem if you begin using them within a few months, however, the only reason I purchased that one was that I wanted to have the number before I left. Typically, you can save at least 50% by purchasing the card once you arrive in the country. For example, in Singapore, if you go to any of the Moneychanger booths in the airport the SIM card is free if you purchase a balance on the card. In the UK, you can purchase an Orange SIM for about 12-15 pounds.

CVO 1K 2 Million

Having bought many SIMs from Telestial I'm also pretty sure there is no "time penalty".
But I would call Ken (the owner & founder of Telestial) and ask him.
I've learned a ton from him about international calls, SIMs, phones, etc.
Tell him that Dan Foreman, says Hi.

GadgetFreak

I have looked at their prices and they are selling those cards at a tremendous premium over what it costs to buy in that country. For instance, the Australian Optus card is $49 (US) and I believe I bought the same card for $30 (AUD). That is more than a 100% markup if Im doing my currency conversions correct. As a result the prices they advertise per minute seem based on the face value of a card, not what you are actually paying for the card and the time on it.

Likewise, the Virgin Mobile UK card is $40. You get about $6 of call credit. Calls to the US are 30 cents a minute. So for that card you can get about 20 minutes of calls to the US. If you calculate based on the price of that card that is about $2 per minute, which is twice what it costs you to roam with a US TMobile number in the US for instance.

Bottom line, it is much, much cheaper to buy a card locally or in some cases even to roam on a US account. As you add to the account the average price per munute comes down of course, but you simply can get the cards for far, far less in the country in which they are used.

Getting a Virgin Mobile SIM at Heathrow for instance is simple, several places sell them at the airport (The Link for one). Do a search on it, there are several threads about getting the cards locally as well as about which ones have better coverage and rates, in the UK and other countries. With Virgin SIMs you walk in pay the price (much, much less then Telestial) and put it in your phone and make a call. Easy as can be.

moondog

try ebay... you could end up with a premium number for less.

Vulcan

I've been a happy user of telestial HopAbroad card. It has worked flawlessly for me in many countries (they list 70 as the number of countries it works in). Its not particularly cheap (.35 incoming and about $1.00 outgoing), but with my travel pattern (heavy leisure, mutiple counties, not a lot of heavy useage in any one country), it has worked very well. No question that it is cheaper to buy a local SIM, but when I'm in a country on leisure travel, I rarely spend more than 20-30 minutes calling home in that country.

GadgetFreak

It seems that at prices and with usage like that it would be cheaper to roam in most countries.

moondog

roaming is all well and good insofar as it provides a means for mom to call, but it isn't very well suited for more local tasks like making dinner reservations, meeting up with friends, etc.

GadgetFreak

While this is true, if you look at the price for the Telestial cards and calculate the per call costs for a short visit it is probably cheaper to roam than to use one of them in many instances. Even for local calls. Locally bought cards are quite a different story of course.

GadgetFreak

If you are interested in a Virgin Mobile card for the UK here is a link to the card for sale at www.expansys.com on their USA site (they are an English company)

http://www.expansys-usa.com/product.asp?code=111537

The card is apparently the same as the card at Telestial. It costs $13.95 at expansys and comes with 10 Euros of calling credit.

The Virgin Mobile card is sold at Telestial for $40.00 and includes 5 Euros of call credit.

I really dont know what else to add...........