[maczealot]

Greetings!

You guys already know that when traveling abroad it is better to buy a local SIM card to avoid being raped by AT&T. That works fine for voice and text but what about prepaid blackberry service? There is no way I am going to pay AT&T $20 per MB for data roaming and I don't travel that often to warrant paying $65 a month for a whole year to get unlimted international blackberry service! AT&T is really screwing us here.

Anyways, back to the topic at hand.

I am starting to see some carriers offer prepaid blackberry services. i.e. Indosat in Indonesia and Telcel in Mexico.

All you have to do is buy a local prepaid SIM card, add money to it and send a text message.

For example If I want 7 days I would text BBI7 and 15 dollars would be deducted from my balance.

I would now have unlimited pin messaging, push emai, internet browsing, IM, etc. for 7 days.

I have read some blogs say that prepaid blackberry service is going to be great for travelers with unlocked blackberrys. Could that be true?

Here's a scenario:

Let's say I have an unlocked AT&T blackberry with the PIN and IMEI registered on AT&T's BIS site.

I go to Mexico and buy a prepaid SIM and activate the blackberry service and get a confirmation SMS.

I am given the option to go to the Telcel BIS site and create an account and set up email accounts. I know I won't be able to create an account on Telcel BIS site because my PIN and IMEI is already registered on AT&T.

This is my question: If my PIN and IMEI are already registered on BIS would I have blackberry service in Mexico just by purchasing the SIM card and buying the blackberry add-on?

If it's necessary to create an account on the local carrier's BIS page to get blackberry service then I don't see how this would help travelers. The device can only be registered on one carrier at a time.

Has anybody tried putting a friend's T-mo SIM card that has Blackberry service into an unlocked AT&T blackberry that has been registered on BIS and have all the blackberry services available?

I want to try doing this on my next trip to Mexico using an unlocked AT&T BB Bold.

Telcel has a 3G network in major cities now. Plan B would be to pay 30 dollars for 7 days using the TCP connection.

Thanks for any comments and sorry for the long post.

[money69]

I would also benefit in Mexico by this new Telcel prepaid option. However, I have movistar there and Tmobile here in the US which has unlimited international BIS for $20 a month and even prorate it for the time you have it on your account. So, with that said right now its not a huge priority for me. Anyway, as far as the BIS option goes you would probably have to have your PIN released from ATT before you can get it working on Telcel. Anyone know for sure? Im also interested in this option.

[maczealot]

Yeah. That's very nice of T-mobile. The only problem is that you have to carry two phones. One to make phone calls and the other for data services.

It would be a hassle to call AT&T to deactivate the PIN. I am hoping that paying Telcel 15 dollars to give me access to the blackberry servers is enough since I already have an account registered on BIS. If this is the case, I hope more carriers start offering prepaid blackberry services. Paying $1.50 per minute and $20 per MB is ridiculous.

I have two Mexican SIM cards. One for Movistar and one for Telcel. Movistar has better promotions,better rates, and their web site is a lot better. What I like about Telcel is that it is very easy to find stores that sell cards to add money to your account. I wish Movistar would hurry up and deploy a 3G network and offer prepaid Blackberry service. Movistar was first in offering data packages to prepaid users. Telcel was basically forced to offer data to prepaid users. Competition is great!

[Canuck13]

Maczealot... I am traveling back and fourth between north american and europe. Were you able to get a pre paided card overseas and still BB and pin message in europe and back in the states?

[Sith_Apprentice]

as long as you have a BB data plan PIN and BBM are included in your plan. They are unlimited up to the limit of the MB that you have.

[Pete6]

You might get a better deal by just signing up for a Mexican data plan AND taking a BlackBerry. Now you have two phones and two dataplans. You set them both to be Data Off When Roaming and then you surf on one phone in the US and the other south of the border.