Australian SIM Card

[paul@skegby.org.]

Would anyone know if you can buy an Australian SIM card in the UK, so I set it up before I travel.

For use as data card only in a Google Nexus 7 Tablet Pay and Go

 

[radamfi]

Australia is covered by the Feel at Home service from 3, so that might be the easiest thing.

http://www.three.co.uk/Discover/Phones/Feel_At_Home

For local SIM cards across the world see

http://prepaidwithdata.wikia.com/wiki/Prepaid_SIM_with_data

 

[DownSouth]

I would suggest simply buying a prepaid SIM from an Optus, Telstra, Vodafone or Virgin Mobile (Optus network reseller) dealer when you arrive here. There are other providers (all just reselling access to one of the three networks) which may be cheaper for the data you want, but they can only do that by selling exclusively over the internet or at supermarkets where you won't get anything remotely resembling customer support.

Optus is the cheapest of the big four for prepaid data recharges (3GB for $29, valid for 30 days) and if you're flying into Melbourne Airport there is an Optus store in the international terminal where you'll be able to get it sorted out. The big four also have tons of stores and licensed dealers everywhere in city centres and suburban shopping precincts.

Vodafone and Virgin may have affiliate deals with the UK companies which are also licensees of the same names, but it's probably simpler to just get a prepaid SIM here rather than having to set up roaming.

 

[jon0844]

Get a Three mobile broadband prepay SIM and pay for whatever data you want. Then it will work in Australia, free. Job done. A prepay SIM will have roaming enabled (I'm 99% sure so might need to check) and a mobile broadband SIM is allowed in a tablet, as well as with tethering.

You can also get a regular Three PAYG SIM and pay for a £15 add on that gives you 300 minutes, some texts and unlimited data for 30 days. But these won't (technically) work in a tablet and you cannot tether. It will be detected and stop working.

Best of all, you can roam on any network Three has an agreement with, so it probably means better coverage.

Vodafone has today launched WorldTraveller that allows you to use your UK minutes, texts and data in Australia, but it's £5 per day! Not terrible, but not great.