Mobile Phone Hire ?

[Silent Tiger]

Im in Pattaya in nxt few weeks for 3 weeks where can i buy or rent a mobile to contact back in UK which is cheapesy way any shops better than others

which i could sell phone back to if i cant hire also how many baht per min to contact England

Many Thanks

[syd barrett]

Buy a second hand telephone in Tukcom for as low as 200-250 Baht. Buy a SIM card for 99 Baht and away you go.

Hiring a phone is not really sensible in Thailand, only in Japan.

[fredob43]

bring your UK one and put a Thai sim in it. If it is blocked I.E. wont work get it opened most good shop's will do this. Top floor BigC will more than likely do it. the cost of a sim ais is 60bt if they cant open buy a second hand one. cheap. price to phone Uk if you use 00844 prefix less than 10 bt min:

Edited April 10, 2010 by fredob43

[Jiu-Jitsu]

HAPPY SIM card in 7/11; 49baht. 5 baht International SMS. Register the SIM online to get free SMS or relatively cheap to Thailand after you leave.

TRUE Inter SIM also 49 baht. With the TRUE Inter SIM calls to UK landlines are 2p per minute. UK mobiles 12p per minute via 00 6 00 44 ********

[game4shame]

as previous posts have suggested - take your (unlocked) phone from home with you and buy a thai SIM for as little as THB50.

calls and SMS to home (UK) are cheap and the SIM purchase is well worth it. as previously mentioned use the 00844 prefix to call (I think there are other prefixes too, possibly depending on mobile company).

you can even buy a basic new mobile if you want for less than THB1000.

[Spoonman]

you can hire a phone at the airport.

[Phil Conners]

you can hire a phone at the airport.

But it would probably cost more in rent per day than you could buy a second hand phone for.

[Silent Tiger]

Many thanks so plenty of places to get phone or take old phone with me ive lost 2 b4 under the influence so just take old thing

will the shop do the SIM for me etc & put the 00844 for me ?

Cheers

[fredob43]

Many thanks so plenty of places to get phone or take old phone with me ive lost 2 b4 under the influence so just take old thing

will the shop do the SIM for me etc & put the 00844 for me ?

Cheers

You put the 00844 prefix in yourself before you put English no: just omit the 0 at start of no:

[game4shame]

Many thanks so plenty of places to get phone or take old phone with me ive lost 2 b4 under the influence so just take old thing

will the shop do the SIM for me etc & put the 00844 for me ?

Cheers

you can try the shop - depending on how busy they are they might set up the SIM for you. BG's are actually useful for setting up SIM cards - saying that, they probably come with english language instructions too so can't see that they'd be too technical.

as fedob43 mentioned, just add 00844 at the start of your numbers for discount rates (remembering to omit the 0 from the dialling code):

eg

UK number you want to call is 01678 893467

just dial 008441678 893467

as I mentioned, there could be other discount prefixes but 008 is the one I use. I'm with DTAC but possibly other companies have different discount codes. the shop you buy it from or BG's should be able to help.

I use my old contract phones from UK when in thailand - no need to buy a new phone if you've an old one lying around. just make sure it's unlocked.

[moo9]

Why hire if you can but basic new phones well below 1,000 Baht?

As mentioned, buy a prepaid SIM and go.

[Basil B]

Many thanks so plenty of places to get phone or take old phone with me ive lost 2 b4 under the influence so just take old thing

will the shop do the SIM for me etc & put the 00844 for me ?

Cheers

If you loose a rented phone it will probably cost you an arm and a leg, so more reason to buy a cheep phone, as long as it is unlocked and is dual band you will be OK.

7-Eleven probably the most convenient and as they are mostly young staff they will set up the sim and top-up for you as well, your only problem is deciding which package you want, I use DTAC "Happy" as I make very few calls but need a phone to be contactable and out of LOS more than 3 months at a time this is ideal for me as even a 50B top-up revalidates the card for 12 months so I am able to retain the same number.

There are a number of cheap overseas calling prefixes, 007, 008 and 009 (there maybe more), the only issue is that they compress the audio and some quality is lost.

[Silent Tiger]

Thanks so much guys