Roaming with Meteor (again)

ferryman

A quick query in relation to getting the roaming bar lifted on my pre-pay Meteor account.

According to one of their CS agents, there must be a credit of €60 on my account, and I must have an Irish credit card registered with them before the bar can be lifted; and even at that, the bar will only be lifted for a maximum of 28 days. Is this true?
I'm heading off for two weeks next Thurs, then I'm back for 5 days before I head off to the UK for a footie match (3 days), then I'm back for a month before I head to another footie match (5 days). When put together, the total number of days during which I'll be out of the country will be 22, 6 days under the 28.

My question is whether I can use these 28 days in any way I wlike i.e. 14 now, 3 in November, 5 in December, and the other 6 any time I like; or must I top-up to €60 every time I wish to roam, even if it is just for an hour as I pass through the north?

Thanks for any help...

samo

no, if you pay your 60e and register the credit card they can lift it for 28 consecutive only days from when you say. The reason for this is they way that the system there schedules the roaming bar, they have to schedule it to come off then reschedule to come back on and it goes mental if you try and do it otherwise.

But chances are you may get someone relativly new that will stick to their guns that its for the duration of travel only. But you def can have for a full 28 day period.

Once you have paid your 60e and gone roaming once and basically not overspent massivley, you dont have to pay that 60e subsequently, you just need to ring up and give dates roaming for in the future, and always for a max of 28 days for each period.

Hope this helps


BTW get them to run thru roaming rates with you, vodafone UK were by the far cheapest in the UK to ring back to Ireland at 0.75c p/m last time I checked but local calls would be cheaper on other networks

ferryman

Cheers for the info Samo, glad to hear that I don't have to top-up by €60 every single time I want to roam, I just hope that the CS agent I happen to get has the same story!
The last time I rang them they said that I *WOULD* have to do this, however the majority of my roaming is to the UK and only for a few days at a time, so crediting my account with €60 just wouldn't be worth it.
I'll give them a buzz later today and see how I get on. The 28 days will be fine this time round (it'll cover my trips in Oct/Nov, but if they're looking for another €60 for Dec they can forget it!!

samo

I worked for Meteor CC and was there for quite a while, but do know that there is widespread puzzlement between reps over the official verdict on roaming topups. I always lifted roaming bar without topping up additional 60 each time if prev roamed but I know others used to say top it up to 60 if they already had 10e on which wasnt neccessary.

Then again there was others that were convinced you had to a straight 60 each time so be prepared for this to be said. If they do persist ask for a supervisor as then should be sorted and explain that you'll be roaming quite a lot. You can also do online topup by accessing my meteor when your away. but do be very careful over the negative balance issue as if you use all credit, as soon as this detected roaming bar will automatically go back on and then major hassle calling back to Ireland to get sorted!

Now I left a few months ago so if this has all changed dont shoot the messenger!

ferryman

Nice one Samo, just another quick question about the credit while roaming...how often will I get the updated billing info? Will need to keep a close eye on it in case I go into the negative balance.
I know what you mean about ringing back to Ireland to get stuff sorted, spent a fortune trying to get a divert set-up the last time I was in Glasgow!

samo

you really cant check balance whilst roaming its not accurate at all, the way it works is that meteor put you directly onto the roaming network (which is the need for all requirements for CC etc to cover themselves) rather than routing cal back to ireland and checking credit before call proceeds.

BUT the roaming partners can take between 2-5 days to send the billing info back to meteor so therefore if you used up all your credit it would be possible due to the delay in receiving charges to build up a negative balance which you could just walk away from being pay as you go.

Because of this reason, it will never really be accurate if you check your balance and i have seen it happen where you have got home, topped up and then 2 days later, roaming charges come in that were delayed and use up all the credit again. You can get a roaming statement sent to you afterwards if you reckon its way out.

Thats why Its a good idea to get a hold of all rates for roaming partners if your going to be roaming fairly regularly so it'll give you a good idea of what its costing you.

Incoming calls wills in the main always be 0.45c and roaming texts around 35c but be very careful for local calls within the UK and manually select Vodafone UK if they are still cheaperst back to ireland rather than going with 1st roaming partner that comes up coz they have about 5 in UK!

That in a nutshell is pretty much everything I know about roaming with meteor!!

daytrader

If your travelling a fair bit to say football games and there short stays then do what i did.

Go and buy a uk sim card.

Virhin cost £10 and you get £5 credit.

Now your first 5 mins each day is 15p and 5p after that.
35p to ring other networks.
10p per text.

Now get this.
15p per min to ring rep of Ireland
20p per text to rep of Ireland.

and.............. most important free to recieve all calls.

just give your uk number to all those who need it.

Q_Ball

ferryman wrote:

glad to hear that I don't have to top-up by €60 every single time I want to roam

You do have to. This is because meteors billing systems are not real-time like vodafone's or O2. When you ring while roaming meteor dont know how much you've spent straight away. They get updates every 3 days. Thats why you can go into a negative balance, your credit is taken away in chunks. The first time you roam you MUST register an irish credit card AND pay a €60 roaming charge. This €60 is added to your account as credit, its not a top up. For every subsequent time you wish to roam, you need to bring your balance upto €60 instead of paying the roaming charge. This is as much a safety net for you to stop you going into a negative balance as it is meteor having a customer in the red. They dont really want to be in precarious the situation where they have a customer who owes €x who can just throw away the sim...

Regarding the 28 days. I know that is not always lifted for 28 days. Usually from what i know the stores lift it for a calendar month. therefore if you go roaming on the 8/12/04, the bar is reapplied 8/1/05. Maybe its laziness on the part of the staff member not calculating 28 days hehe

Hope this clarifies things a little more.

kevinmcc

Thats pure rubbish about Meteor getting details of calls and texts you send every 3 days. I use my Meteor phone in the North and South everyday and the credit is always taken straight off when I am roaming on Orange UK, Vodafone UK etc. The calls and texts I sent can also be seen on my meteor the same day. Also although the bar is only supposed to be lifted for a month I've had roaming activated for about 3 months now.

ferryman

A few comments on the last couple of posts...

The Virgin sim-card idea is a good one. Have had one for the last two years, it's just a bit of a pain giving other people the number, far easier having the one number while at home and away. Tried getting my Irish number diverted into my Virgin number to make things easier. Worked perfectly the first time, second time round (after a couple of tries) one of Meteor's CS reps started saying that it isn't possible to do this...Usual crap from CS agents which was costing me a fortune as I was in Scotland at the time! Finally I just left it, next time I travelled I bit the bullet, registered my credit card and topped up by the 60 Euro. The roaming bar was then lifted for a month, meaning that I could roam until roughly the 15th of November. Last week before I headed to Scotland again to take in a few matches, I rang 1905 and asked to get the bar lifted once more. This time, the lovely lassie I spoke to was very helpful, I asked her to lift the bar and she did, no top-up required.

As for the real-time billing...It does, in some cases take a few days for the credit to be withdrawn from the account. However the UK seems to be quite quick with this. Incoming calls seem to be charged on-the-fly, although any outgoing calls can take up to 3 days (As Q-Ball said). As far as I can tell, a certain portion of the SMS charge is applied in real-time, with the remaining amount being deducted at a later stage. I just got back late last night, so I'm still waiting to see if my balance will change to reflect calls and texts I made/sent since Tuesday night. Will post here if it does.

Ciaran