Great Way To Save On UK Calls To Kuwait
I’ve made it a habit that when I’m traveling to a country where I’ll be staying for more than a few days I buy a local pre-paid sim card for my mobile phone. It works out a LOT cheaper than roaming. In the UK I use Orange because the number remains valid for 6 months from the time you last use it (the others expire after 90 days).
Of course you still have the problem of paying ridiculous charges if you want to make an overseas call. I think calling Kuwait is something like £1.50/min ! Then when I last went to London someone told me about a mobile network company where overseas calls are really cheap. My first impression was, “yeah right, where’s the catch? Let me guess, you pay something like £2 as a connection fee for every call.” Anyway I put my doubts to one side and decided to check it out.
The company is called Lycamobile and I was told that you can buy the sim cards from corner shops which sell phone cards in Edgware Road and Queensway. At this point the guy explaining to me had a look on his face that said “you really should know about this already, its in your back yard !”. I managed to get the sim card in the end from a shop in Shepherd’s Bush near the new (and quite stunning) Westfield mall.
I was surprised to find out that the sim card is effectively free. It cost £5 but with £5 of credit included. And then I checked the list of rates. Amazingly calling a Kuwait mobile number or land line on Lycamobile is only 10p a minute (which works out at less than 50 fils/minute!!! ) International SMS messages also cost 10p each. The other cool thing is that calls are free between Lyca mobiles – which is great if you are traveling to London in a group and need to stay in touch.
So what about the call quality ? Well I have used it a few times. It is a bit hit and miss. Sometimes its very good, but sometimes the quality is poor. You get the impression you are calling over the Net and sometimes you need to end the call and dial again to get a better connection. On the whole though I would say the quality is acceptable. The number itself is a standard UK mobile number on the Orange network so people can call you locally as they normally would with any other UK number.
Overall, despite its drawbacks on call quality I would have to say its well worth using Lycamobile next time you’re visiting England. You’ll save a stash of cash.
Here is the link to the website where you can also find the calling rates to all other countries:
4 Responses Leave a comment
haha ive heard about it bas i havent tried it yet cuz i think exactly the same way you did…there must be some sorta trick, must be! :P
i liked the phrase ‘stash of cash’ hehe cracked me up!
btw is ur blog on wordpress?..the commentbox looks the same as mine..bas the weird thing is that im not signed in here for some reason, so i had to type the login info by hand..anyways..dont mind me im just thinking out loud.. =)
This has saved me alot of money! They even add extra credit when you top up which is a bonus. £5 has given me a number of decent calls to Kuwait and you can top up in most places. Thanks for letting me know about this!
desertpalms: Yeah the blog is on wordpress so not sure why that’s happening. Still getting to grips with all this blogging stuff :p I’ll check it out, thanks!
Za: Good to hear. I had no idea they also give you extra credit, that’s pretty good !