WhatsApp launches flat fee WhatSim, cheap calls everywhere

[Jonathan Fairfield]

WhatsApp launches flat fee WhatSim, cheap calls everywhere

WhatsApp, the popular chat and messaging app, has announced the new WhatSim card which offers super cheap calls anywhere in the world for a yearly flat fee.

The WhatSim card is designed to be used with WhatsApp; you pay no contract and incoming calls are free. The card promises complete freedom from contracts and around 85% off calls, texts and the mobile Internet.

By using WhatSim it means that instead of a single contract with a mobile provider, you have just one SIM that works with the network which offers the best service in your area, wherever you are in the world. The company has already done deals with more than 400 mobile companies in 150 countries, and charges a flat fee of 10 Euros per year for unlimited text messaging. However, picture messages, calls, video and voice messages are charged extra, but you should only pay local call costs wherever you are.

Read more: http://tech.thaivisa.com/whatsapp-launches-whatsim/3702/

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

It's not clear to me how or if you can actually make or receive voice phone calls using this product.

If you read the FAQ info on their website, it specifically says:

Can I make calls, send text messages or surf the Internet?
No, you can only use WhatSim to chatting using messaging apps.

And when I read the fine print of their website, it talks about messaging and sending voice and photo/video messages...but nothing about voice calling.

WhatSim lets you exchange not only text messages and emoticons but also photos, videos, voice messages, share locations and contacts.

[astral]

WhatsApp allows voice messages, photos and video already

so what is new?

Not sure I want to take my standard SIM out, and loose the number I have had for several years

Edited February 2, 2015 by astral

[RichCor]

Mashaway | Italian company introduces WhatSim with free WhatsApp service worldwide

"WhatSim allows unlimited text messages, location sharing, contacts

but doesn’t allow free sharing of multimedia files like audio and video.

In order to access these files you need to have credits,

for that a user has to pay €5 which will get the user 1000 credits

allowing the user to share 50 photos or 10 videos thus making it almost transparent.

The current cost of acquiring this SIM is €10 with additional shipping charges to your country.

You can buy one for yourself here.

Oh, and the promotional text on the official WhatSim website is just awful.

The small print: whatsim.com/en/rates

WhatSim is designed for personal and responsible use.

With the initial cost of € 10, within one year since the activation, you have the right to send and receive text messages, up to a maximum of total data traffic exchanged during a year of 50 Mb (approximately 25,000 text messages of around 2Kb) in zone 1 or 25 Mb (approximately 12,500 text messages of around 2Kb) in zone 2 or 15 Mb (approximately 7,500 text messages of around 2Kb) in zone 3 or 10 Mb (approximately 5,000 text messages of around 2Kb) in zone 4 or 7.5 Mb (approximately 3,750 text messages of around 2Kb) in zone 5 or 3.5 Mb (approximately 1,750 posts text of around 2Kb) in zone 6. The number of text messages per zone and size are purely indicative. Data sessions are priced with unit charge increments of 1 Kb in zone 1, 2, 3, 4 and unit charge increments of 10 Kb in zone 5 and 6.

WhatSim lets you exchange not only text messages and emoticons but also photos, videos, voice messages, share locations and contacts. The amount consumed of data traffic differs however depending on the type of content sent or received. For example, text messages and emoticons consume very little data traffic. Sending just text messages and emoticons means being able to send a huge quantity of messages with the traffic included or recharged. We suggest to disable the automatic downloading of multimedia content to avoid downloading it by mistake. In any case, before downloading or sending multimedia content, check the size of the multimedia content to avoid to be charged of excessive costs.

In the Recharge section you can recharge from a minimum of €5 (1000 credits) up to a maximum of €50 (10,000 credits).

Example: in zone 1, if you top-up €5 you get 1,000 credits, which let you exchange approximately 100 photos of the size of around 200 Kb or 20 videos lasting around 10 seconds.

WhatSim might be OK for a Dual-SIM phone, or for someone who's travelling through a bunch of countries. Otherwise its usefulness seems very limited (text/emoticons only).

Some might be better off paying for a 'social' add-on pack through their current mobile provider that allows more options ... though most social add-ons don't allow live voice chat or voice calling without also paying for Internet).

AIS Social Pack unlimited test/image add-on for 5 baht/day or less.

DTAC Super Social or Unlimited! FaceBook, Line! add-on for 12 or 7 baht/day

TRUEmove H Unlimited Social Buffet for 15 baht/day or a specific chat program for 5 baht/day

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

WhatsApp allows voice messages, photos and video already

so what is new?

Not sure I want to take my standard SIM out, and loose the number I have had for several years

I gather, what's new here is, their product, for its price, gives you pretty much worldwide data access to What's App type messaging, without having to worry about a) being out of your mobile provider's data service area, or b] in the alternative, having to rely on finding wifi for Whatsapp communications.

But... when I read their info, the obvious question that occurred to me was.... unless you have a dual SIM phone, to use the WhatsApp SIM, you'd have to TAKE OUT your regular mobile provider SIM and presumably lose all the service and data associated with that. No voice calls, no mobile data from your mobile plan.

But...for someone who's traveling often outside of their home base and doesn't have some kind of economical roaming arrangement, I guess it could make sense.... if a person was a very heavy TEXT/MESSAGING user.

However, the reason I posted here was... the OP article and big headline that got posted appears to be wrong in saying that this product provides low-cost voice calling to users. I can't find any mention of that on the WhatsApp SIM website. It would seem unlikely that their product includes voice calling but they somehow neglected to mention that on their website.

Edited February 2, 2015 by TallGuyJohninBKK

[Xircal]

It's only for sending text messages apparently: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/dont-fall-whatsim-expensive-pay-go/

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

It's only for sending text messages apparently: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/dont-fall-whatsim-expensive-pay-go/

There's an interesting debate going on in that post...

Basically, the author is taking the position that it's better and more economical for travelers to simply buy a local SIM wherever they visit, and thus gain access to calling, data and messaging for what he claims typically would be a lower price than WhatSIM.

But then, there are a lot of comments in the response to the article from travelers who argue they don't want to take the time and hassle every time they visit a different country to search around, find and buy a new local SIM for each place. As one said, when I'm on vacation, I just want to be able to stay in touch, not spend time shopping for SIM cards.

For me, I'm inclined to side with the author of the post, and these days, usually wifi is available somewhere that provides Internet access and, when using apps like LINE and Google Hangouts, also makes available data calling and messaging.

However, I will say, over the holidays, I had to transit thru Guangzhou Airport in China for a layover of a few hours. Never had been thru there before and upon arrival, I discovered they had airport wifi...BUT.... it was only available if you had a China local mobile number, which I did not.

In the end, I searched and found a pizza shop in the terminal that offered free wifi for its customers. So I bought a pizza, had my dinner on an outbound trip, used their wifi during dinner and thereafter, and then used the same wifi on my return trip thru that airport (at 5 am in the morning) by sitting nearby the same shop even though it was closed at the time.

That said, I suspect China is more the exception than the rule these days when it comes to finding freely available wifi in some manner.

[astral]

@Tallguy

for its price, gives you pretty much worldwide data access to What's App type messaging, without having to worry about a) being out of your mobile provider's data service area, or b] in the alternative, having to rely on finding wifi for Whatsapp communications.

That is a valid point

However in the last year I have been overseas two times and my phone has failed to roam

but I have kept in touch with my friends in the evenings, using WhatsApp and the hotel wifi

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

My wife and I used to use What'sApp to keep in touch during the day, since it's a very low-data-use way of communicating, and easy for her to use at work vs. voice calls.

But, once Google Hangouts and LINE both added voice and video calling in addition to their original text messaging, we started using those apps predominantly and pretty much abandoned What'sApp -- even though most of the time, we're still texting instead of doing voice or video calls.

Though curiously, I got my elderly father in the U.S. an Android tablet for Christmas and set it up for him with the apps I thought he'd want to use, including LINE and Google Hangouts. Since my return to LOS after the holidays, he and I have done both voice and video calls between Thailand and the U.S. using both LINE and Hangouts each time using our same home wifi internet connections. And the Hangouts call and video quality has been great, whereas the LINE audio quality is terrible, virtually unuseable.

However, LINE voice calling via data seems to work decently OK for my wife and I using our respective wifi and/or 3G data plans here in LOS at home and at work.

Edited February 3, 2015 by TallGuyJohninBKK