Phone sim cards for use in Egypt

[LaBimb]

Hi Folks
I am going to Sharm & Dahab in a couple of weeks
Anybody got any experience of using international / local phone sim cards to keep phone costs down over while over there . I use the phone to keep in touch with the other half when I am diving ,and forking out for UK phone rates is not my idea of fun .

Cheers Graham .

[milldog]

try here Roam and phone

Graham

[Druid]

I bought a local SIM card when I was in Dahab last year, it cost me LE60, plus LE10 credit. I had to put credit on every couple of months to keep the phone registered, even though I still had credit on it.

[Roger Cardy]

The cost of using your uk phone is truly mad, £1.30/ min plus the vat, came back with £100 bill last time. I will have a look as i did some comparisonsa while back, will post later. It will still cost you to call the uk poss 30 to 50p/min, but calls to your mobile will cost you nothing and 6ppm from a uk landline.

Roger

[Bardo]

Originally Posted by LaBimb

Hi Folks
I am going to Sharm & Dahab in a couple of weeks
Anybody got any experience of using international / local phone sim cards to keep phone costs down over while over there . I use the phone to keep in touch with the other half when I am diving ,and forking out for UK phone rates is not my idea of fun .

Cheers Graham .

Some quite useful info on using a mobile phone abroad on the Virgin Mobile website...

Virgin Mobile (uk) - Going abroad

Info on using a Virgin PAYG phone in Egypt here...

Virgin Mobile (uk) - Coverage And Roaming

Best peice of advice I can give you about using a phone abroad is to set the phone to unconditional divert all calls to your voicemail whilst you're away - trust me, it'll save you a fortune!!!!!

[Jimbo200SX]

It depends on what phone company your with, but with some, if your contract is around £30 per month or more then you can get International Traveller Service (ITS- at least i think thats what it is called). With this all calls too or from abroad cost a maximum of 30p/min, though the companies seem a bit shy about telling you about it - i found out by accident when I had to call Japan a few times and didnt get a huge bill!!

[Allie T]

This might be worth taking a look at Mobinil - personal - GSM tourist line if you've got an unlocked mobile.

Not used it myself so can't make any real constructive comments, I've only just escaped from Orange who's roaming charges were truly astonishing.

Bestest

Allie

[Jim Dowling]

the two main options in the sinai are mobinil and vodafone-eg. i use vodafone as it seems to have a lower call-drop rate but to be honest i don't think there is much of a difference...
before my missus moved out here we were chatting on the phone every night (awwww! ) and a 100LE (£10 sterling) phoncard would last about 10mins continuous use. using my uk sim card resulted in horrendous bills as i would just stay on the phone longer!
to keep in touch with uk, the best bet is skype, there are loads of free wi-fi hotspots in sharm, and a fair few in dahab too. only really feasible if you're going to bring out a laptop of skype compatible handset.
hope this helps.
jim