My future may not be orange!

[Jackie]

LAST EDITED ON 10-Jun-04 AT 06:08 PM (BST)

I have been looking back on postings about mobile phones. The reason for this is that having bought a 10 Euro recharge for the Orange mobile we find that the number has been lost as the phone was not used for the last 8 months. (Yes I know now it is in the very small print somewhere and on a 20Euro card, and maybe others as well, you get 6 months reception after the two month period)

We are told that it will cost 30 Euros to get a new number. Now we only want the wretched thing (he said all bitter and twisted) for that never to be hoped for emergency when away from the house in the car etc. I am sure that in the UK we had an Orange phone and that the credit did not all disappear every 15 days/2months etc, as it seems to do here.

What we want then is a phone that does not lose its number and preferably its credit if you don't use it and is always available in an emergency without paying for a regular contract. "He is not asking for much"! I hear you cry. I get the impression that this is too much to hope for in France, am I right people, or does someone know something I don't know?. Unprintable thing does not even work where we live as the signal is too weak so cannot use up credit that way! Please do share your thoughts, rant over. .....Jackie and John in Dept 79

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In theory (never had to try in practice thankfully) a non-numbered, non credited mobile phone should be able to call the emergency number, regardless of whether or not it has credit.

Tim

[LesLauriers]

If you really only want a phone for dire emergencies and the odd vital call then I would suggest you do what we did for the first two years. We bought a Virgin UK Pay As You Go phone and signed up (free) for international use which meant that they gave us a credit limit of 100 GBP on the basis of a direct debit to our UK bank account, I believe you may be able to use a UK credit card as an alternative. See www.virgin.co.uk .

Whilst clearly more expensive than a French airtime provider they are by far the cheapest UK provider of airtime in France in terms of making and receiving calls.

Best of all you do not get disconnected and do not have to pay a monthly subscription which is what the French PAYG system is, but by another name!

We now have an Orange PAYG but only because we are making a lot of calls now.

[Boghound]

Was the Orange mobile bought in France? If so. Obtain the unlock code and buy an UK sim card on the net or through friends in UK. Then arrange to update card on a credit card English or French and as long as you make/receive one call per 6 months the card, even a 10, lasts for ever.

[Liz]

I actually thought the Orange package of 10 Euros every 6 months was quite a good deal! I bought it so that people (mostly those staying in the gite) could phone me in case of emergency. Mine doesn't work either on the ground floor of our house but it is OK upstairs and I think that would probably apply no matter which provider it was.

I am sure that it is correct that in case of situations where you reequire the emergency services your phone will work.

You did ask for thoughts to be shared, you can rely on getting a different point of view on this forum

Liz (29)