The Age Newspaper, 11th June 1996

You can take it with you

About to jet out with your digital mobile phone in your bag, but no idea how to use it beyond Australia? GERALD J. GOUY sets out the options.

You have swapped your analog mobile phone for a digital handset, ready for your big overseas trip. The salesman has assured you that using it abroad will be as easy as turning it on when you walk into the arrivals hall, with a slightly longer wait while the handset searches for a carrier.

It sounds fairly straightforward, but there is one important detail: does your handset work in the countries you are heading for? Yes, maybe or not at all.

An already big, but growing, pool of countries share the same technical standards as Australia, allowing connections through their networks. But a few important destinations are still off the air for Australian travellers with their own handsets.

Austel-approved Australian digital phones use the European-developed GSM (Global System for Mobile communications) system. Originally a pan-European digital cellular standard, GSM has spread further and about 70 networks now operate in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia-Pacific region, Australia and New Zealand.

Last August, 138 operators in 77 countries signed a memorandum of understanding on GSM and are implementing, or planning to implement, networks.

Not part of this agreement are the Americas and Japan, which have developed their own digital cellular network standards, presently incompatible with ours.

A key GSM component is the SIM (subscriber identity module) card, a credit card-sized smartcard which is inserted into a GSM phone to make it work. The SIM card identifies the subscriber to the network, and makes the user's personal portfolio of services available at the mobile phone.

Telstra, Optus and Vodafone all offer roaming (the ability to use your mobile outside your original "home" area) but this is where the similarity ends. There are big differences in the way the carriers operate their roaming.

There are basically two types of roaming - automatic and SIM card. If your network has an auto-roaming agreement with a network in Britain, you can, in theory, get off the plane at Heathrow, turn on your handset and have local coverage "within 30 seconds".

You should also still be contactable on your usual number so that someone calling you from Australia will reach you whether you're across the street or in a pub in Manchester.

For card roaming, the network provides you with an international access SIM card, and a special number which allows you to connect to certain foreign digital cellular networks.

Dialling out is the same but to reach someone using card roaming you have to dial a different number (normally the international access code, the country code and the special roaming mobile number without the first digit).

This can make things difficult if the person you're trying to reach is travelling through several countries.

Telstra offers international roaming to 27 countries, through its ReadyRoam (fully automatic), or CardRoam (SIM card) services. Before going overseas you contact MobileNet to find out which service you'll need. For CardRoam, an access card is sent to you, usually within four days. Telstra says users do not pay an extra connection or monthly access fee for the roaming service.

For countries on ReadyRoam, customers must still apply for roaming approval (basically a credit check). Telstra says this application should be made at least seven days before departure, although it could be done in two or three days.

Vodafone operates GSM digital networks in several countries. Unlike its two competitors, it sells airtime on its network to wholesalers, who then sell airtime to users at differing rates. These wholesalers are known as resellers and include groups like Digicall, which offer different roaming prices, all under the Vodafone umbrella.

Vodafone has 41 countries in its global roaming network and claims to have the biggest roaming network. There are 21 Automatic Global Roaming (fully automatic) and 20 Plastic Roaming (SIM card) countries.

Before leaving Australia, travellers contact their service provider, who activates Global Roaming and provides coverage details. For Plastic Roaming, travellers must get a SmartCard from the service provider, to put in the mobile digital phone.

This enables the phone to operate in countries not yet connected to Vodafone's Automatic Global Roaming network. Plastic Roaming usually requires travellers to get a new phone number for use overseas.

The Optus AutoRoam system is seamless, meaning you don't need special SIM cards for particular countries - you just use your normal Optus SIM card. So long as Optus has a roaming agreement with a network operator in that country then you can just turn your phone on and use it as normal.

People in Australia - perhaps not even knowing you are out of the country - can call you on your mobile phone. They will be billed only for the Australian leg of the call and you will pick up the tab for the international leg. And wherever you are, you have to dial into Australia on the international code to connect to your home service, to call out again.

Even if someone on the other side of the Champs d'Elyse'es from you in Paris makes a call to your mobile phone, you will be billed for the cost of the call coming back from Australia. Your friend, of course, pays the international call to Australia.

For this reason, all the networks suggest you set your phone to Unconditional Call Diversion (Divert All Calls) to your message mailbox. If you haven't set a diversion and your phone is turned off, out of coverage or busy, then you'll still pay for the cost of having the "not reachable" message sent back to Australia.

To set the diversion, contact your carrier before leaving or simply enter the command **21 (your voicemail box number) END.

With an unconditional diversion to your mailbox in place you should still be able to retrieve your messages, although in practice this can sometimes be difficult.

Another feature common to all three networks is the billing procedure - all roaming bills are charged to the customer's normal account statement in Australian dollars. If you'll be away from Australia for more than one month, some carriers suggest pre-paying to put your account in credit. The bills from your overseas roaming calls can take up to four months before they appear on your account - your local network must first wait to receive the bill from the overseas network. Check these bills as carefully as you would check your credit card statements from overseas - inaccurate charging by some overseas networks is not uncommon.

The actual charges for making calls from your mobile overseas vary greatly from country to country. Calls within the country you're in are generally quite reasonable compared to public phones, but international calls are prohibitively expensive. Contact your carrier for details of the rates in different countries.

Security is also important when taking your phone overseas. Before you leave you should record the IMEI (serial) number of your handset and ensure that your SIM card pin number has been changed from the original 0000 - this is the first combination that any thief would try because so many people don't bother, or know how, to change the SIM card's pin. Imagine the cost if the thief were able to guess the pin before you contacted the carrier to report the theft.

Take the SIM card out of the phone if you have to leave it unattended.