Talk:Israel/@comment-26423297-20170328154033/@comment-27066773-20170328172106

Oh, generally speaking, there are some "offline" kiosks and cellphone shops in Israel who sell the cards with nearly same surcharge like some eBay sellers! What about "cheapest" HOT mobile card for 100-120 NIS? Cash only accepted, no credit cards.

If you bargain a bit, they will drop the price off to 70-80 NIS. As they can tell, "okay my friend, 70 NIS for the SIM card, and 30 NIS for the data plan". But it will be the minimal possible package! So 20 NIS minimum is total surcharge.

Empty SIM card without packages can't be so expensive. Okay, let it be 50 NIS, as maximum, but 70-90 NIS for the empty card? Not only some "touristic" Jerusalem arabic stores, but even lots of kiosks in Tel-Aviv are doing the same thing!

Yeah, this is Israel. You should bargain everywhere in Israel! With the cellular company, with the Internet provider, with the bank account manager! And if you are shy and can't do that, you will pay a surcharge!

So this country can be tricky. Friendly, multicultural and very vivid, but tricky. Not globally, but the devil is in the details!