Pre-paid SIM Card for the Philippines

Cell phones have become a part of everyday like today. It has become almost a tool that we cannot do without. When mobile telephony was first introduced, cell phones were with only handful of people and only those were lucky enough to be in touch with the world. There were a few countries in the world which had mobile networks and very few in the world who could afford the luxury. Today, a cell phone has become the way of life.

During that time when you went for a visit abroad, you had no option but to use the telephone in your hotel room, to call your business associates, friends, the family back home, and booking and reserving seats at the restaurants and theaters. You were aware about the costs involved in using the hotel telephone, but there was no other way.

When cell phones became as much popular as they are today, you had taken yours along with you, when you last visited abroad. Your cell phone was on roaming. This provides you with the facility to make and receive calls from practically anywhere in the world.

Roaming provides you with the ability to automatically make and receive calls, transfer and receive data or access other services, when you are travelling outside the geographical coverage area of your home network. If you have a roaming facility, as you move from your home geographical area to another, you become a visitor to the network of that area. If you are in the same country as your home operator, you are on National Roaming. If you are visiting another country and your cell phone is on roaming, you are on International Roaming. If this roaming facility is between two different standards, it is called Inter Standard Roaming.

In providing you with roaming facility, your home service provider has entered into a commercial contract with the network operator that you are visiting and in doing so, your visiting network lets you utilise its services, based on the commercial agreement. This is the reason why you are charged at roaming costs for the calls that you make and receive while on roaming. Roaming is expensive.

There is a way you can save substantially on calls when you visit the Philippines. A pre-paid SIM card for the Philippines saves you up to 80% of your expenses on your cell phone calls. When you buy a pre-paid SIM card for the Philippines, you get a local number and all your outgoing calls are charged at local rates. All your incoming calls are free of charge and you do not pay for roaming. You do not enter into any contract with any service provider and you do not receive any bill at the end of the month.

When you buy a pre-paid SIM card for the Philippines, you get a small talk time credit along with. This enables you to use your cell phone straight away when you reach your destination in the Philippines. To top up your talk time credit, you can purchase recharge coupons or vouchers from practically any shop in the cities of that country. These coupons are available in different values and you can buy the right denomination depending upon the talk time credit that you want. Since you pre-pay for your calls, you are aware of the expense that you are incurring for your calls and in this way you are in control of the budget that you have set for the purpose.

When you visit the Philippines, you would need a GSM handset, to make and receive calls. If you have a GSM cell phone, it is unlikely that it would work in the Philippines, unless you have a multiple frequency phone. Networks in the Philippines operate on
900MHz and 1800MHz GSM frequency bands, where-as, networks in the countries in North America, Canada and a few other neighbouring ones, operate on 850MHz and 1900MHz frequency bands. This difference in frequency bands does not let your GSM phone operable in the Philippines. You will need either a multi frequency cell phone or one that is compatible with the frequency bandwidth in the Philippines.

In order to facilitate the use of cell phones universally, there are three types of such phones available in the world market. The Quad-band phone complies with all GSM bandwidths and would work in any of the GSM country in the world. The Tri-band is compatible with 800MHz, 900MHz and 1800MHz frequency bands, and operates in most part of the GSM region, while the Dual-band responds to 800MHz and 1900MHz GSM frequency bands.

If you are a frequent traveller, you may consider buying a compatible cell phone which would work in the countries that you visit. If you are not so frequent a traveller, it is economical for you to rent a phone which will match the frequency bands with the networks of the country that you are visiting.

It is important that you take care of two things before you take your cell phone with you on your visit to the Philippines. The first thing is make sure that the cell phone is not SIM locked and second, that it matches the network frequency bands of the Philippines.

A pre-paid SIM card for the Philippines is not only affordable but provides you with fairly large savings on your cell phone usage. The most important savings are that you pay as the locals do and all your incoming calls are free, no matter where it generates from. Further, you do not pay for roaming. By pre-paying for your calls, you are quite aware of the money that you are spending on your cell phone usage and in this way you are able to control your expenditures to remain within the budget that you have set for yourself.