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Cheapest French SIM Card?


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I very stupidly let my SFR sim card expire (bought from 0044 last year and haven't topped it up since!) so will need to get a replacement when we go to France on Tuesday. Any pointers as to which is the cheapest one you can buy (in Normandy)? We really need it for my OH whilst he is in France for the next 6 weeks for me to call him from home in the UK.

Thanks for any advice!

Ewa

Devon & 27
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Thank you Jayjay, sounds like the one for us! Where can we get it and what would we ask for? Our French isn't too brilliant so is it easy to activate once purchased? Thanks for your help!

Ewa

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You can get one off the NRJ site if you have a French address & carte bancaire. If not you can buy them in Carrefour, Darty & not sure, but maybe Boulanger as well.

To activate it, dial 675 300. You will receive a text message back, that will have a pass number. Go on the website, put in your mobile number & the pass number, this will then give you access to your mobile account. 

 

 

 

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Jayjay,

 

Thanks for ther info. One further question. You say "must be used once every 6 months" Is that used in France or can it be used roaming abroad.

 

I spend half the year in France and half elsewhere. The problem I currently have with Orange is that I buy two 10€ top ups and beg the indulgance of a driend to top up the cardafetr 5 months to make sure the line remains active and then again just beore I arrive back.

 

If I could keep ther thing topped up before I leave France and then keep it valid by using it when abroad it will solve my problem.

 

Is NRJ a stand alone network?

 

Best wishes,

Terry

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Hello Terry

Roaming or NRJ Mobile Away (catchy name & in English!) is automatic. I presume that to keep the line active it would include a call from abroad, as the line is being used. But I don't know, maybe best to check 1st.  Also, NRJ uses the SFR network, which has quite good coverage.

BTW, you can activate/de-activate several things including 'roaming'  in your account, online.

 

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Ewa,

If the main reason for the mobile is for you in the UK to keep in touch with your husband in France, I would also suggest you consider him taking a Vodafone UK Pay As You Go (or contract) SIM / Mobile.

Vodafone have a service called “Vodafone Passport”. The way it works is, when the mobile is used abroad, the mobile user pays a connection fee of 75p and then, for incoming calls (to the Vodafone in France), there is no other cost for a call up to 60 minutes.  Calls made from the mobile to UK while abroad cost 75p connection fee and then the normal cost as if the mobile was in the UK calling another UK number.

So, if you phoned your husband while he was in France, it would cost him 75p out of his Pay As You Go credit and you would pay the normal cost of calling a Vodafone mobile.  If you used a Vodafone Pay As You Go mobile / SIM to phone him that would be 5p per minute after the first 3 minutes in that day at 30ppm.  A 30 minute call would therefore cost (in total charges) about £3.00, about half the cost of phoning a French network mobile using OneTel in the UK..

You can get further details here:  http://online.vodafone.co.uk/dispatch/Portal/appmanager/vodafone/wrp?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=Page_BOS_MainContent&pageID=GM_0337 or from a Vodafone network shop.

Note you need to request “Passport” to be set up on the mobile number and make sure that when the mobile is abroad it connects to a “Vodafone partner network” – this is SFR in France.  You need to make sure the mobile is manually locked onto SFR and not allowed to automatically select the strongest available network.  You’d also need to keep a top-up card in the UK to buy credit for his mobile while he is in France.

 

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Thank you for your advice Ecossais. I returned from France early this morning and read your post and promptly rang Vodaphone to get his phone registered to Passport (he's already a Vodaphone monthly customer). I have subsequently also found his monthly plan was pretty useless for us as well, so have changed that too! Wonderful bit of advice which will keep us going for this trip and for the forseeable until we get a landline installed. Thank you once again.

Ewa

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Hi Ewa,

It’s good that your husband is already on Vodafone, so he can get the “Passport” deal.

Remember, to get the “Passport” rates your husband’s mobile MUST connect to SFR when he’s in France.  If it roams onto, for example Orange, he will not get the “Passport” rates.  A UK mobile when abroad by default will always search for the strongest available network at any time – he MUST manually set the phone to operate on SFR ONLY.  Instructions for this (“manual network selection”) will be in the instruction book if it’s not apparent from the menus.

The upside is the cheap calls, the downside is that at times another network would possibly give better reception, but he will be no worse off than if he was using an SFR SIM.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Have read all this with great interest and am keen on getting this nrj simcard for my uk mobile (we live in france so all our calls are france -france but of course go throguh the uk). we only have the phone for emergencies, it is pay as you go and we have stuck with this roundabout way of doing things because of the limited validity of french payg mobiles ive seen so far, Nrj looks different and would eb the answer for us if it works. 

 

My question is this. will this simcard that i can buy from nrj online for €15 work with any phone? i mean am i obliged to buy a new phone or can i put this simcard in my english bought nokia (currently with vodafone). the phone is about a  year old  and is fairly basic. I mean are sim cards universal?

 

grateful for any advice and sorry if this is a stupid question, i am mobile phone illiterate

Maria

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My Nokia is about 3 years old.  The thing hadn't been used for almost 2 years.  O2 pay-as-you-go or whatever they are called now had obviously suspended my account after such a long time with no activity.  Bought an NRJ sim and away we go - no probs.

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Maria,

The majority of Pay As You Go mobiles are “locked” to the network they were bought on, so they will only work with that network’s SIM cards.  Sometimes another network SIM will work as Cassis found.

If your UK PAYG phone has the Vodafone logo on it, it will most likely be locked.  However NRJ is a “virtual network” (it works on the SFR network / antennae) and SFR is the French cousin of Vodafone, so there is an outside possibility that an NRJ SIM will work.

Do you know anyone who is on NRJ?  If so, try their SIM in your phone.  If it works – great!  If not, you will need to get the mobile unlocked.  If you don’t know anyone on NRJ, try an Orange SIM – if that works your phone will be unlocked.  If you need to get your mobile unlocked you may find this helpful:  http://www.completefrance.com/cs/forums/710422/ShowPost.aspx

 

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Another slightly more expensive but slightly more convenient method is that Orange (and others) do a subscription SIM for 7€ per month. Its not "pay as you go2 but billed (automatically taken from your French bank account). Its no commitment contract (i.e. cancel at any time). Calls are slightly cheaper than PAYG (but not much). I use is as I never have to worry about top-ups, using every so often, etc. (though I clearly pay for that).

I found the Orange 7€ deal the best as it includes things like Caller Number Display for free (SFR were charging extra for those features) plus, my house has good Orange coverage but poor coverage from other networks.

Easy to get (and FT shop and takes a few minutes).

Don't know what the offer/deal is now as I got mine some time ago and maybe offerings have changed.


Ian


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NO NO  DONT USE BREIZH

Read my other posts,   the issue has still not been resolved, they continue to put the phone down or promise to send a new card and do not.  Someone else I recommended has now been suspended after one month with Paye as you go and is having the same ^problems,  now if its on a monthly contract, they dont seem to be a problem.

Lollie   44

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