Talk:Germany/@comment-24682153-20150917184347

In light of recent events that many migrants are coming to Germany right now, here are some guidelines for you. Normally we don't care for voice rates but because there are only few unbiased English-speaking forums around and you don't yet speak the local language, we should make an exception as many of you want to communicate with your family back home or on their way.

You will be greeted by German Willkommenskultur and touts or agents of ethno-providers like Lycamobile as soon as you enter Germany. When they give you a "free" SIM card, you can take it as a gift. But there is nothing like unlimited free mobile internet or free overseas calls from Germany. There are different companies competing in the market. Check around for the best rates.

You are allowed to buy and use any prepaid card which is on the list or not, regardless of your status in Germany. For registration/activation, you can use any street address that you know of in Germany. Though you will be banned from contracts for quite a while (see comment below).

Calls outside of the EU like to the Middle East can be quite expensive on German mobile providers. Better stick to operators focused on the migrant's market like Lycamobile, Lebara, Blauworld and a few others. The Turkish market is covered by special providers like ayyildiz and Turkcell Germany.

If you want to call for a while to the Middle East, you generally have two choices to minimize your expenses:

1.) try to use a landline. On Telekom use special call-by-call prefixes, which differ for each destination and if made to landlines or mobiles. On other providers use call-back or call-through options.

2.) try to use VoIP (Skype, Viber, Whatsapp and many more) through a WIFI (locally called WLAN) or (if not available) over mobile internet.

These two options are much cheaper than using regular mobile connections by Lycamobile and others. But their agents will not tell you that. Welcome to Germany.