I have an unlocked quad-band GSM phone. I understand I can put a prepaid sim chip in the phone and use it.
3 questions:
a) If I buy a prepaid card in Germany and roam into Denmark, say, can I still use the german prepaid sim card? Does this answer change if you use one of the more pan-european GSM providers (Vodafone, Orange, T-Mobile)
b) Is there a good place to buy these things either pre-departure or on arrival?
c) Anyone have any good leads on a service with good rates for a short-term traveller?
I can only give you some very vague information while someone who knows more comes along.
My advice is to just buy one after you arrive. There should be plenty of stores where you can buy one. Be prepared to show ID and have it registered in your name (welcome to the “free world”).
My experience is that roaming rates in Europe are insanely high and if you do enough roaming it is worth getting a SIM in each place. Again, ask before you buy.
You can probably find all the info you need online. I do not know what companies do business in Germany but you can start with Deutsche Telecom (T-mobile?) , Vodafone and the like. Googling should give you plenty of info.
I’ve got an O2 sim card for my spare phone that I use when I’m in Germany. It was 14.99 plus another 15 Euro worth of minutes. I really don’t know or particularly care what the per minute rate is. I mainly have it so I can call locally or be reached from outside of the country without paying $1.29 a minute*.
In Germany at least, and I think this holds true for most or all of Europe, there is no charge to receive calls on your mobile.
For calling out I use my work phone or go to a Call Shop. Call shops in Frankfurt charge about 5-8 cents a minute to call back to the USA, but in other towns (Munich or the small town where I stay) I’ve paid more like 30 cents a minute. (Euro Cents)
*This is what ATT charges for receiving calls on my US number when I’m in Germany. There are no partial minutes, and I can’t call out, but I can receive calls. You can of course set up your mobile for roaming in Europe but it’s still stupid expensive.
Should add, a long time ago I had another mobile that I set up to roam. At the time this was a much bigger deal than just a “burner” phone for use in the USA. Not sure how much this has changed. Mainly I think they wanted a credit card number as protection. At that time I was using D2, which I believe was a sub of Deutsche Telecomm. This was around 1998-2000. Europe has gone through a lot of deregulation since.
It is generally possible to use the prepaid SIM while roaming outside the country. I work for a Danish GSM provider and it would certainly be possible with ours, but I remember one of our fellow providers not supporting foreign roaming some years ago. I would generally expect it to be possible but a little expensive. If you’re going to use it for more than a few calls, a local SIM is a better alternative.
Stay away from roaming data. Voice calls can be expensive, this is just crazy. We’re talking +10 USD per MB.
In addition to the traditional phone providers themselves, there are now prepaid cards sold by different discount retailers like Aldi.
They are a bit cheaper and roaming is definitely possible.
How does registration/activation work?
I’ve heard that some of these require a national mailing address/EU ID card, whereas some you can get away with a passport?
Also, some require internet activation (on a website with presumably no english) ?
Two things to add, every pay as you go SIM I’ve had has worked just fine without me having to register it. Roaming charges too are meant to have dropped EU wide, perhaps something to check out on the provider’s website.