OT: PAYG SIM cards

[nothanks]

My main SIM (I have a dual-SIM phone) is on a contract and uses the Vodafone network; I want to get a second (back-up) PAYG SIM for emergency use on those occasions when I'm out of Vodafone coverage. I wish it was easy to get a multi-network SIM which just "worked" on whichever network was available, but they seem to be rare and expensive. I'm therefore looking for a PAYG SIM which doesn't use Vodafone, which doesn't expire (or has a long period before it does expire), and which (ideally) doesn't require a contract. Any recommendations?

Secondary question: my car has a built-in SIM which seems to be able to phone home (its "home") from anywhere so, presumably, it works on all networks. How is that possible or affordable?

[Tim+]

Define ?emergency?. If you?re dialling 999 you current phone will use any available network. If you mean for non-999 calls have a look at Isle of Man sims (Manx Telecom I think). You certainly used to be able to get a PAYG sim that would use any available network in mainland UK.

Tim

[Brian]

I use 1p mobile SIM in a Hive like system in our motorhome. They do various deals, the best one seemed to be £30 for a SIM which is preloaded with £30 worth of calls, texts etc. Calls are 1p a min, SMS, 1p, data 1p / M. You can set up to auto renew. Runs for a year. No need to top up, use etc.

They do £10 ones, 120 days, same rates. Again, you can auto renew, etc. I use one of those for projects.

Uses EE so has 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G.

You create account, order SIM, stick in phone, it activates quickly, and just works.

[Chris Green]

idMobile still has 3-2-1 PAYGO like Three used to be. It uses the Three network.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Three

Pass

[Dave Plowman (News]

I decided to resurrect the spare phone for emergency use and wanted PAYG. Was most surprised I could no longer get a PAYG sim in Tesco.

GiffGaff do offer one - but not that obvious on their site.

Think you have to make at least one call a month to keep it active. And if you don't, you also lose any prepaid credit.

[Chris Green]

idMobile still do real PAYGO, you do have to wade through lots of bundle offers to get to it. It's still on the 3-2-1 rates that Three used to offer too. Standard 'use it every three months (or maybe it's six)' to keep it alive.

[Tim+]

Looks like they only work for a month at a time before your credit expires.

I still think Manx telecom is probably good for anyone wanting a roaming sim in the UK.

Tim

[nothanks]

Apologies, I should have said "urgency" (car breakdown is the obvious example) rather than "emergency". If you mean for non-999 calls have a look at Isle of

An interesting idea ... it seems they roam on 3, EE and Vodafone but only have short roaming expiry periods (I think they may also need an IOM address)

[Roger]

As credit expires after 90 days it's not really suitable for use as a back-up. Far better to get an ordinary UK SIM which doesn't use the Vodafone infrastructure. Even if the charge is an expensive 20p per SMS that's 50 SMSs. At one SMS per month £10 credit would last just over 4 years. There's a good number of providers which charge less than 10p per minute/SMS on Pete Forman's page:

[nothanks]

the charges are pretty steep.

[nothanks]

That's a VERY useful link (assuming the info is accurate, of course). Thanks!

[Andy Burns]

Three have a contact called "SIM Zero" you have to sign up and IIRC link it to a bank/credit card, but it will quite happily sit unused for years and just work if/when you come to use it ... quite expensive for data, so make sure that's disabled on the "emergency" phone you leave it in, you don't want the emergency phone to start downloading 100 app updates when you turn it on ...

[nothanks]

After a while going through the Ts&Cs it seems that RWG (who I hadn't heard of until following your link) are the company to go with. Thanks again.

[#Paul]

My Tesco has Tesco ones, but if you want the PAYG sims that

*don't* start out on a plan costing ?10/15/etc per month, you have to go to the mobile phone shop bit; as they aren't in the near-till displays with all the usual lebara/etc sims

#Paul

[SH]

One thing that would be *really* useful is pre-loaded Data SIMs for the following scenario:

I have gigabit fibre broadband.

I liek to have a backup internet in case the gigabit fibre goes down.

To this end I have a 4g router connected to my network on 192.168.0.2 (the fibre broadband is on 192.168.0.1)

So What I'd like is to have some PAYG sims that has say 10GB or 20GB pre-loaded valid for say 30 days from first use.

I can then put in a data SIM into an unpowerwed 4g router

So when the fibre goes down,

power up the 4g router Go into my pi-hole and change the gateway from 192.168.0.1 to 192.168.0.2

I can then have backup internet until either:

the fibre internet comes back up

or

when the data bundle runs out, I can either top it up or stick another data SIM in.

I would not be averse to having several data sims across EE, O2, Vodafone & 3 to build in further resilience should a mobile network go down as well... (after all, EE is owned by BT, Vodafone own gigafast and Virginmedia now own O2.)

[Andy Burns]

I have a 4G dongle in my router (actually it's on the end of a long USB cable up in the loft) with a Three Data Reward SIM, this gives 200MB of free data each month, so it allows you to test that it's working (either by switching over to it briefly, or by selectively routing a few subnets over 4G which you can ping).

I don't have 4G set to automatically become primary if the VDSL goes down, because 200MB can be burnt through far too quickly, but in case of a "worthwhile" outage, I could use the 4G connection to pay for a data pack to keep it going for a few days ...

[SH]

Thats a useful link, ta...

Be aware that if you use a MVNO (Mobile virtual network operator) that they may not have the same level of speeds or access as that enjoyed by the customers of the parent network.

For example, Giff Gaff piggybacks onto O2.

I have tried both GiffGaff and O2 data sims in my 4g router and without exception, 02 is faster than Giff Gaff according to speedtest.net

Also EE use channel bonding where 2 off 40 Mhz channels are bonded to give you 80 Mbit/s... none of the MVNOs piggybacking onto EE can offer channel bonding.

So something to be aware of when signing up to a MVNO sim.

[John Walliker]

I think this one is quite good for data backup: "Three Mobile Pay As You Go Mobile Broadband 24 GB data SIM" You get 24Gbyte of data and the sim keeps working until you have either used up the data or 24 months has expired. from the date you started using it. Don't top it up - just buy a new one. It currently costs £45, but is sometimes available for less.

John

[SH]

wow... a linky to the data sim would good..... and if anyone knows of anything similar for EE, Voda and O2?