How to dial a US cell phone?

vote4pedro

Hiya, not sure if this is the right forum, cant find a straight up tech help forum though there's prob one staring me in the face.

Basically Im looking to dial a US "cell" phone from my Irish landline, and it's proving surprisingly frustrating. Google hasn't been much help to me, so I turn to boards. Ive received a text from my sisters phone, lets say its +12011111111 but dialling that from the house phone doesnt work, nor does adding in 00 or 01 or anything else before it. A rather simple problem I know, but its been driving me loco for the last fifteen minutes

BuffyBot

You dial it the same as any other us number

00 1 234 5678901

where 234 is the area code and what follows is the number

vote4pedro

Hmm, thats what Ive been doing but to no luck. Perphaps a problem at her end, i remember being there and having awful trouble with not being able to receive calls/texts when out of credit.
Thanks!

mobius42

In the US, you are charged for receiving calls as well as for making them, so if you have no credit, no one can ring you!

Ah-Watch

mobius42 wrote: »

In the US, you are charged for receiving calls as well as for making them, so if you have no credit, no one can ring you!

OMG! hardly for receiving calls, I know for prepay texts but for calls!!!!

testicle

Yes, and they are about to bring it in here in Europe too...

Ah-Watch

testicle wrote: »

Yes, and they are about to bring it in here in Europe too...

Well they can go S**G themselves vodafone and o2 are making enough already without charging more ontop

Skyuser

mobius42 wrote: »

In the US, you are charged for receiving calls as well as for making them, so if you have no credit, no one can ring you!

Is that not only when roaming. Hardly charged for recieving calls on an american mobile?

LolaLuv

Nah, you're charged for receiving them as well. Except after 9pm, after which (in most cases) all calls are free. Is it true this system is coming to Europe? Anybody know when?

cgarvey

Most US cell plans charge on incoming calls as well, as you get a local number, not a separate non-geographical number like here (so caller doesn't know if they're calling a landline or a cell phone). Most plans include minute bundles with various options like free on-network calls, or off-peak inbound, or whatever.

rogue-entity

Ah-Watch wrote: »

OMG! hardly for receiving calls, I know for prepay texts but for calls!!!!

mobius42 wrote: »

In the US, you are charged for receiving calls as well as for making them, so if you have no credit, no one can ring you!

PillyPen wrote: »

Nah, you're charged for receiving them as well. Except after 9pm, after which (in most cases) all calls are free. Is it true this system is coming to Europe? Anybody know when?

As CG said, in the US the system is different.

Here, the prefix 08 was assigned, and it allowed mobile phone operators to charge a termination fee to others for routing calls onto their customers. This cant be done in the US, so they instead charge their customers to receive calls and texts. That is probably why pre-pay phones never took off in the US and most phone companies also sell family plans. The bill plans work out a lot cheaper, some offer free incoming calls/texts.
Sprint for example has a plan with unlimited texts, and data, and free incoming calls for $30/month. That is by far better value than any plan on an European Operator.
Because O2 charge per-minute about 18c or so to Vodafone, Three, Meteor Eircom and the other phone operators, to call O2 customers, they end up making the same amount of money anyway if not more.

I sincerely doubt they will introduce charges on receiving texts and calls while still being allowed to charge that termination fee to other network operators routing calls to their customers. And they would have no excuse for introducing those charges after over a decade of not having them, unless Comreg and its counterparts decided to scrap the mobile-phone prefix and allow the assignment of geographic numbers to mobile phones.

cgarvey wrote: »

Most US cell plans charge on incoming calls as well, as you get a local number, not a separate non-geographical number like here (so caller doesn't know if they're calling a landline or a cell phone). Most plans include minute bundles with various options like free on-network calls, or off-peak inbound, or whatever.

And to compound this, Canada stupidly shares the same numbering system, and international country code, so you cant tell that easily if the number you are calling is in the US or Canada let alone a landline or mobile.

Random

This might help you in the future though with other countries and dialing - http://www.numberingplans.com/?page=dialling&sub=instructions