I have been developing some apps that need to act differently when they are roaming. The problem was how to test this. I needed a ‘foreign’ SIM card which didn’t seem to be much of a problem.

However, looking deeper, I realised that most of the ‘international’ travel SIMs actually have a UK number - and I am in the UK! Also, many expire any credit every month and require regular topping up. To make things even more difficult, many pay as you go SIMs require topping up while you are (connected) in that country.

I ended my search with airBalticCard Mobile which I received today and works 100% as promised. Air Baltic is an airline that offers a SIM with…

• The credit doesn’t expire (the card will after 2 years if not used)
• An Estonia number
• Registration and topup online (no need to be in Estonia!)
• Reasonable outgoing call costs (via a callback) should I ever need it

… great for testing roaming functionality as long as you don’t also need roaming data.

Related Articles:

• Mobile Number Lookups
• Pay as You Go Data
• Bladox Hardware and Applications

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008 at 4:29 pm and is filed under Mobile, Network Operators. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.