You can buy a UK sim and then use it in france also...you will b
roaming in france of course. OTOH, you can just buy an internationa
card that will cover both countries. Pretty much all internationa
cards cover both countries with free incoming just. I own a couple o
Intn'l cards and and a Virgin UK card myself.

You will get much better responses in the prepaid forum. You can als
compare the cards there.

http://www.prepaidgsm.net/forum

--
mrcamp

In alt.cellular.gsm Newby <nobody@nowhere.net> wrote:

    Just pick one up when you arrive.  I can't tell you anything
about Paris, but I imagine it's a similar situation.  You can get them
free or very cheap at most places and usually pre-loaded with a small
amount of credit.  If you absolutely need it before hand (I don't see
why other than knowing your number ahead of travel) then see if you can
order directly online.  Most places that offer the SIMS for standard
carrriers for re-sale online get the free SIMS and re-sell them at a
high price online, complete rip-off.  Maybe you'd find something
reasonable on e-bay as a third alternative.  Fourth idea is to have one
of your friends over there buy it and ship it.

    As far as activation, if it doesn't come pre-activated and they
don't allow you to roam outside of the country (most pre-paid European
SIMS do) that could be an issue.  Then again: 1) activate when you
arrive or 2) have a friend take care of it.

Newby schrieb:

Maybe you will find on
http://www.globalsim.net/
a solution wich is adequate and you can test it even in the USA before
starting your trip to europe.

try
http://www.experimentalist.co.uk/simcards/maxsim.html

Whilst the global SIMs mentioned above have free incoming calls in
many countries, their own tariffs are not as cheap as using local
cards in some countries. They can be used more cheaply with separate
callback, but this starts to get quite a bit more complicated ...

I think you might consider having separate local SIMs

For UK, probably the first choice would be T-mobile. 12 pence a minute
calls to UK landlines and mobiles, and optional add-on package of 50
minutes to USA for £2, i.e 4 pence a minute, which is applied for by
text message, up to 6 bundles are allowed

http://www.t-mobile.co.uk/personal/pages.do/our-services/costs-from-the-uk/bundles

SIMs are available on the T-mobile website, free or 50p, posted to a
UK address about 3 weeks after application

Other than T-mobile, MobileWorld (a brand of the retailer
CarphoneWarehouse) has 5 oence a minute calls to USA, and so does
Orange on a SIM version CallAbroad

French SIMs don't have such good rates ordinarily, but there are
bundle options on Orange or SFR has a tariff option of only the first
minute charged, both for a few euros, and either could be used with a
calling card.

Or if you want to use only one SIM for both countries and are willing
to get a bit more complicated, get an O2 UK SIM, and for £10 for
MyEurope Extra you have free incoming calls in France (31 European
countries in fact) and outgoing at 25 pence. But using callback of
www.returncall.co.uk - paid by a £5 sms in the UK - you can make 5
pence a minute calls to USA from UK or France (their rates may have
gone up a bit by then, so keep an eye on it nearer the time)