Going wireless in Europe: what you need to know about cell phones
Part 1 of 2 articles: the second covers cellular data in Europe
Last updated: 18 February 2008
To many Americans, staying in touch with a cell phone while in Europe can seem difficult and expensive. But savvy travelers know it doesn’t have to be. Having a phone while you’re there can be a major time saver and convenience. Friends and family can reach you easily. You can spontaneously pull out the guidebook, pick a restaurant and call to see if they can accommodate you before jumping into a car or taxi. This article tells you how to stay in touch and save money.
 Advanced mobile wireless use in Lucca, Italy |
Why don’t US cell phones “just work” in Europe? For various reasons, the United States developed and deployed wireless technologies that were incompatible with those deployed in the Rest Of the World, which went with a single standard called GSM (”Global System for Mobiles” - this is one of the reasons why Europeans use the term “mobile” and not “cell phone”).
This meant that for many years, the only option for US travelers to Europe was to rent a GSM phone, which was expensive and inconvenient. No one could reach you on your US cell phone number; you had the hassle and expense of receiving and returning the phone, and both handset rental and calls were astonishingly expensive.
GSM comes to America
Today, you can buy US mobile phones that use the GSM system from AT&T Wireless and T-Mobile. So why don’t these phones “just work” in Europe? Although they use GSM, they work on different radio frequencies. To function in Europe, a GSM phone must operate (at the very least) on the 1800MHz frequency; to get the best European coverage it must operate on both 900MHz and 1800MHz.
The first GSM “world phones” supported three bands: 900/1800MHz (for
Europe) and 1900MHz (for the USA). However, US GSM carriers are now expanding their wireless coverage using the 850MHz frequency band. So you won’t get the best coverage in the USA with a 900/1800/1900 tri-band phone.
Thus you now need a quad-band GSM phone in order to get good coverage world-wide (850/900/1800/1900Mhz). There are more and more quad-band GSM phones coming on to the market every month, though they tend to be high-end models. To plug the gap, US GSM carriers are offering new tri-band “world phones” that operate on 850/1800/1900MHz. These offer the best coverage in the US, but limited coverage in Europe. The Sony-Ericsson Z310-A offered by AT&T is one example.
What if my carrier doesn’t use the GSM system?
There are two other major carriers in the US who don’t use GSM: Sprint(Nextel) and Verizon Wireless. Verizon uses a system called CDMA, and Sprint uses both CDMA and another proprietary system called iDEN, originally developed for Nextel. If you have a cell phone contract with Verizon or Sprint, you do have one alternative. Both sell the Samsung A790, a combined CDMA/GSM world phone which works on Verizon or Sprint CDMA network in the US, and offers 900/1800Mhz coverage in Europe. You can take your US wireless number with you when you use GSM networks outside the USA.
Sprint offers a flat rate $1.50 per minute overseas roaming charge for most GSM countries (i.e. those where Sprint-Nextel has a roaming agreement). For Verizon subscribers, the story is not so good: Verizon’s rates are staggeringly expensive for incoming calls and voice mail retrieval. For the vast majority of GSM countries, Verizon’s GSM roaming charges are $1.29 per minute, but for incoming calls and calls to retrieve your voice mail, you are also charged “long distance charges” (whatever that means - no other carrier charges this way). These long distance charges vary from $0.65 to $8.20 per minute, depending on where you are when the call arrives. In addition, the phone costs $550 and does not offer 800MHz analog cellular coverage, which can be handy in the US since CDMA coverage can be spotty outside major cities.
Cutting the cost of calling
Per-minute call charges on a European pre-paid GSM phone can be up to 80% cheaper than rental phones or roaming charges on your own account, and incoming calls are free. However, there are disadvantages. You can’t use your own cell phone number any more, and you will need enough local language proficiency to purchase “recharge” or “Top up” cards and activate them using a telephone menu. Also, due to billing limitations, many pre-paid GSM phones will only work in the country where you purchased them. But if you are willing to put up with the extra complexity, this approach can save you a lot of money.
Pre-paid wireless is service without a contract or credit check. You buy air time with cash, and then talk away the minutes until you’re down to zero and buy some more. It is relevant to Americans because you don’t have a credit rating or bank account in the country you are visiting. Financially, you don’t exist, so until pre-paid came along you couldn’t sign a European mobile service contract.
You can now fly to Europe, buy the cheapest pre-paid GSM phone you can find with cold hard cash, mutter “stuff your contract!” at the baffled staff and then call your mom. Typically, the cost of all this is less than a week’s rental of a GSM phone. At the end of your trip you can keep the phone for next time, recycle it, or sell it to a street urchin (just kidding - you’d sell it on eBay when you got back).
Clearly, a drawback of pre-paid is that you need to buy a phone you may never use again, unless you travel to Europe often. So why can’t you use your own GSM world phone for pre-paid service?
Pre-paid using your own GSM world phone
In the GSM system, your phone number and other identifying information are stored on a little chip: the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM). It’s a fingernail-sized smart card that slides into the back of your GSM phone under the battery (on most models). When you buy a European pre-paid GSM phone, it contains a “pre-paid SIM” issued by the carrier. If you already had a GSM world phone, you could go to Europe, take out the SIM from your US carrier, buy just the pre-paid SIM and put it in your own phone. No need
to lay out 60 Euros or thereabouts on an extra phone you didn’t really want.
But we’re forgetting one important detail. In 99% of cases, people buy GSM phones from their carrier, such as AT&T or T-Mobile (the other 1% bought theirs on eBay specifically to avoid the problem I am about to describe). AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon want you to use a SIM that they issued, otherwise they will lose out on those fat international roaming minutes, so all phones that they sell are “network locked”. “Network locking” ensures that only SIM cards issued by a specific carrier will work in that phone. If you put a SIM from a different carrier into a network locked GSM phone, it will refuse to operate.
Fortunately, all networked locked phones can be unlocked, because locking is implemented in software. Nokia phones can be unlocked using a code that is computed from the phone’s ID. Sony Ericsson phones need a code that is dependent on the ID and the keypad lock code, but which can only be computed by connecting the phone to a computer with a special cable. There are hundreds (possibly thousands) of web sites offering phone unlocking services and equipment - try Googling “Nokia phone unlock”. Typical costs range from free to $20. I had a Sony Ericsson T68i unlocked by a friendly chap in San Francisco who hangs out on the AT&T on-line forums (message boards). He charges $20 and has the requisite cable and software. A 20-minute call in Italy using a Telecom Italia Mobile pre-paid SIM was enough to break even on the cost of unlocking.
The Apple iPhone
The iPhone is in a class of its own when it comes to international roaming, and not just because of its unique design and features. It is a quad-band GSM world phone, so you can use it world-wide. Unlike any other phone, in addition to being network locked to AT&T, the iPhone is also tied to your Apple iTunes account so SIM unlocking by itself is useless. However, help is at hand: those friendly phone unlocking services on the Internet have figured out how to unlock the phone and also break its connection with iTunes so you can slide a different SIM card in there. Visual Voicemail won’t work (it relies on stuff AT&T does in its network), but many figure that’s a small price to pay. Regular voicemail works just fine. Some unlocking services also provide after-sales service: if Apple releases an iPhone software update that invalidates their unlocking, they will unlock the new software for you at no extra charge.
Handy tips for a phone-stress-free European trip
- When buying a “world phone” make sure that it operates on 1800MHz frequency, and ideally on both 900 & 1800MHz. If it does not, it won’t work outside the US.
- A quad-band 850/900/1800/1900 MHz phone offers the best world-wide coverage
- Before you leave, call your carrier and tell them to turn on international voice and data roaming. It’s turned off by default. Even if you bought a world-phone when you signed up for service, and/or told the nice sales or activation person that’s why you went with them vs. Verizon or Sprint. It is turned off by defaut as an anti-fraud measure.
- Sometimes, you cannot call US 800/888/877/866 numbers from foreign countries. So find out the non-800 number for your cell phone carrier’s customer support before you leave. That goes for any other 800 numbers you are planning to call when overseas. Calling 611 or any other “short code” (in industry lingo) may also not work, so don’t rely on it.
- To call internationally when outside the US, you need to know the country code of the place you’re dialing. The US country code is 1 — pretty simple. France is 33, the UK is 44… there’s a whole list.
- To call internationally from a mobile phone, enter a plus sign (+), followed by the country code, followed by the number. For example, to call 415 555 1212 from Europe, you’d dial +1 415 555 1212 on your phone. Finding the plus sign on the keypad of your phone can be hard… keep looking, it is there somewhere! You might need to hold a key down to get the plus sign.
- When calling from a non-mobile phone (e.g. a payphone or hotel phone) remember that the international access code in Europe is 00, not 011. For example, to call 415 555 1212 from a payphone in Europe, dial 00 1 415 555 1212.
- When making an international call to any European phone number that begins with a zero, omit the zero — unless you are calling Italy. For example, to call the UK number 01606 54321 from France, you’d dial +44 1606 54321. + is the international prefix, 44 is the country code, then the number with the leading zero omitted. Italy is the lone exception — if you need to call there don’t drop the leading zero.
- Enjoy your trip, and don’t forget to call home!
What about e-mail, data etc?
You’ll be needing part 2 of this article series, which covers mobile data services. Get it here.
Links
The GSM Association:A trade association that also maintains world-wide GSM coverage maps showing all carriers and frequencies used.
Search eBay for unlocked GSM world phones
Google result for “Nokia phone unlock”
Tags: cell phone, cheap, europe, lower, mobile phone, pre-paid, price, rental, SIM, world phone
February 22nd, 2008 at 8:31 (8:31 am)
[...] you read the previous article, you now know the answer to the question “why doesn’t my American cell phone just work [...]
March 2nd, 2008 at 22:23 (10:23 pm)
One reader tells me that when in Italy, he bought a pre-paid phone from TIM (Telecom Italia Mobile) and asked the shop to set it up in English. He can then follow English voice prompts to reload the phone with Euros to make calls. So… if you want to follow the pre-paid route, try this out!