France seems to be one of the most awkward countries in which to buy a pre-paid SIM, as every French SIM must be registered within 14 days of being used, or the line will be terminated.
Like KernowLad, I think roaming's reasonably cost-effective for short trips, though per-day caps are still more of a pain than per-month ones - and going over the quota by even a few MB gets real expensive, real quick :x
I've previously used Orange UK's £3 for 30MB per day, and tethered my (wifi-only) iPad to my iPhone. It ended up being fine, but Orange's website/app didn't correctly show the bundle I was on (so I was always nervous I was going to come home to a mahoosive bill), and 30MB never ended up being enough (at least, not to relax and not constantly toggle roaming on and off, which is a faff on an iPhone). Orange have
just announced an increase to 100MB per day; if they'd done that before the summer, I wouldn't have bothered doing the following...
As we're only going to France, and I wanted a data-only SIM for a mifi device so that we could tether our his+hers iPads to it :lol: , I've opted for:
The SIM card itself is
free (unlike many others) and comes with €40 credit (of unlimited duration) which can then exchanged for
data bundles. They require you to post (to a French address) or email your photo ID to them (not super-happy about emailing a photo of my driving license!) to register your SIM - but only once you've activated it by connecting to the network.
I'll let you know how I get on
Cheers,
Steve
PS I'm aware that you can "just buy" an Orange.fr data SIM (on their new "
Let's go" tariff, which has replaced the older
Mobicarte one), but:
- we're trying to stay away from large towns, and don't want to waste time in a mobile phone shop
- my French isn't good enough
- you allegedly need proof of residency (sometimes), and I'm not going to lie and give a fake address, and as we're holidaying nomads we don't have a hotel (or even a campsite!)
- I found lots of comments saying how infuriatingly slow and unhelpful Orange.fr processes/staff were