Job Discussion Forums

[lennon146]

Hi there,

Can anyone tell me if mobile/cell phones are expensive in Mexico? Would I be better buying one in the UK before I leave? (my last one was stolen on a train in Romania - worst luck!)

Also, with a UK phone, do you need any special equipment to use it within Mexico? Just a Mexican sim card?

Any advice welcome!

Paul

[thelmadatter]

Cell phones in Mexico arent ridiculously expensive but they aint cheap either. I got my cell 2 years ago from Unefon for $1500 MN (pesos not dollars) It has since gone down in price to about $1000 MN (of course!!) This is more expensive than the States. I dont know about the UK. I also have no idea if all you need is to swap a sim card ... anyone more technologically oriented than I am?

[Guy Courchesne]

I find Mexican technicians can MacGyver up just about anything technical. Not sure on the Sim car from the UK though.

You can pick up a cheap throwaway pay-as-you-go phone here for 600 pesos that comes with 300 or more pesos air time. Good to remember that you don't pay with airtime when someone calls you...only when you make calls from the cell, so it can be cheap if you want it to be.

Paul, I would say that if you already had a phone, then bring it and see. But if it's a question of buying one, just pick one up here.

Actually...just thought of something. There is a Canadian teacher departing the same day you arrive in DF. Do you want to buy her phone? She bought recently and won't need it going home. PM me if this idea fits.

[Ben Round de Bloc]

Depending on how basic of a cell phone you want, in Merida you can now get a new one for as little as little as 400 pesos with 200 hours of air time. Of course, if you want one that takes photos and videos, it'll cost you a lot more.

Almost everybody I know here has a cell phone (except me.) My houseboy, the guys who lug concrete blocks and bags of cement around all day long at Cemento Marza next door to my house, at least 80% of my students . . .

As Guy mentioned, as long as you only make a few short phone calls and send messages -- let your friends call you -- a cell phone can be inexpensive to own. Receiving long distance calls can be a different matter, in that some require that both the caller and the receiver pay air time on long distance calls. Since there are so many different deals available, it's important to check things out carefully before you buy. For example, some places require that you purchase 200 hours of air time every month, whether you use that many hours or not. Some places have decent guarantees on their phones (replace them if they die,) while others don't. Some have a family-&-friends plan, where you can put up to 10 people on your list and call them for free in combo with other offers. No problem in this city finding places that sell cell phones. It seems there are stands on every corner downtown, in every supermarket, in every major store . . . they're everywhere. You can buy the debit-type Amigo time cards everywhere, too. You can even buy them from your car at intersections while you're waiting for the light to change.

[lozwich]

Good points, but I believe that the GSM system that is widely used in the UK is not fully operational in Mexico? When I was there last year GSM type phones only had coverage in very small service areas, and the rest of the country used TDMA. Basically, that's the technology in the phone, not the type of SIM you have. So, like somebody else said, I wouldn't buy one just to bring it to Mexico and find out it doesn't work where you end up living.

Good luck!
Lozwich.

[Flo]

As Guy said, a basic phone here will cost around 600 pesos and you get 300 pesos of credit with it. If you want a phone that does other things like taking pictures or videos, you can spend a lot more. I bought a phone in Peru, and like yourself, it was stolen. So, when I came to Mexico I brought my super old paper-weight Nokia from the states. They activated it for 100 pesos and it does just about everything the Mexica phones do. Lately there have beens some good deals to get extra airtime for free.

There are several cellular companies here. The most popular, I belive, is TelCel. It cost almost 4 pesos a minute to call a land phone, 2.5 pesos to call another cellular, and 1 pesos a minute to call other TelCel number that are in your "friend list". Text messages are around 80 cents (mexican). It costs 4 pesos to call the cell phone from a pay phone, and 2.5 pesos a minute to call from a home or business. The calls you recieve are free, but if you get a call from outside the country, you have to pay for long distance or something like that.

The phones here are not cheap, but compared to getting a phone installed in the house, it is an OK deal. You can buy a cellular for 600 pesos and have it activated the same day. The line to the house, on the other hand, will set you back over 1500 pesos and you have to wait about 2 months for the people to come and install it.

[dangermouse24]

You will find that cell phones generally cost alot less to purchase in Mexico in comparison to going rates back in the Uk. You can get cheap but reasonably good 'pay as you go' phones for as little as $369 pesos (about 20 pounds +- with the current exchange rate) with $300+ pesos airtime. Really it all depends on what you want from a phone, the company, the city and the store where you purchase it.

As far as plans/contract phones go for rates etc i've found it's the better option however it is difficult to get one on an fm-3. Cell phone companies will usually require that you pay for the year up front (at the min rate of $299pesos/month +tax and paying the difference as you use it) So, unless you get a Mexican to contract it for you in their name....

If you bring a Uk cell phone with you it is quite possible that it won't actually work here for 2 reasons. The first being that alot of (but not all) companies "lock" the phones ie program them so that they don't accept sim cards from other cell phone companies. The second being that Uk cell phones work on a network frequency of 900/1800Mhz where as in Mexico it's 1900Mhz. Dual/tri/quad band phones aren't overly common in either the Uk or Mexico and are among the higher priced phones though they are becoming increasingly popular.

Should you already have a Uk phone and decide to bring it with you and see what happens I recommend you make sure the charger works on dual voltage and that you get a good travel adaptor before you leave. You wont have so many problems trying to find it over there. Otherwise a new charger for your phone could turn out to be quite pricy.

[Fatcat]

so what do you depend on, cell or land line? Here in the States I've rarely had a land line in the past 5 or so years and it hasn't bothered me a bit. It's much more economical here, especially since I make a lot of long distance calls and $60 USD a month is pretty good for all the time I spend on the phone. I guess what I need to know is, are long distance calls back to the States less expensive with land lines or cell phones? Thanks for the help!
Fatty

[Guy Courchesne]

They are more expensive with a cell phone..making and receiving the calls, though there might be somebody with a deal going on out there. Landline calls to the US are about 15 -40 us cents per minutes on a landline, again, probably with some deals being offered out there.

[MELEE]

Fatcat, I don't "depend" on either, and don't usually think about my cell phone until it rings. I do however depend on the internet to do most of my communicating. I don't have internet at home, because there are not land lines available where I live. I only broke down and got a cell phone when I was pregnant. Sometimes my parents call me from the US and it costs me about 100 pesos to receive a half hour phone call from them, so when land lines become available in my area I will get one. When I call them I do it from a public landline and it costs me 4 pesos a minute.

Also, while there are several cellular companies, at least two of which claim to have "national coverage" I could only get a Telcel phone because its the only one that has reception where I live, but I still have to lean out the window and I spend half the conversations saying "What?, I didn't get that. Are you there? Can you hear me?"

[Ms. Atondo]

[ls650]

On another note, you may end up in a location where no one uses a handphone. In my little town, virtually none of the students or teachers have either a handphone or a land line. The town is small enough that you can walk from one side to the other in less than 15 minutes; if you need to talk to a friend or co-worker, you just walk over and bang on their door!

I'm the rare exception to the rule, as I have a land line for my computer's dial-up modem. I never use it for voice calls - it's cheaper to go outside and use the payphone on the corner.

[Guy Courchesne]

[Cdaniels]