You are leaving the UK and need to keep your UK telephone number because your bank or others entities may send you verification SMS? That is exactly the situation I am in. I have a Natwest Bank account and I only need my number to receive alerts or OPT SMS and I want to do it very cheap! Not only that, if you are thinking of travelling abroad, it has a great roaming policy with 41 destinations and all your allowance abroad.
Cheapest Network Provider
Lebara mobile will be your best option here. It’s the cheapest network out there which uses Vodafone signal, meaning there is a great coverage worldwide.
Things you may need to consider
Lebara price was great, however I needed to ensure this would be last sim and it would be a hassle-free service. To be honest, it has been very easy to migrate to them. I was at Vodafone, I requested my PAC code by SMS without dealing with my provider. Once I received the new Lebara sim and it was activated, I did the port in from their website. You can choose the date of the port in, in case you want to use up your current Data or anything else.
In the Uk OFCOM has made it easy to switch networks. Simply Text PAC to 65075 to Switch UK Mobile Operators. You will get an SMS with your code which will be required by your new company to bring in your existing number.
- You can keep your existing number
- Make sure to activate your new SIM while in the UK! – I had mine sent to Spain and couldn’t activate it, so I had a friend pickup a duplicate and activate it for me and send it abroad.
- They provide all sim sizes for your Iphone, Android no matter the make/model.
- Manage all your services through an APP
My journey with Lebara
I am travelling to the USA and pretty much all network providers do not provide free roaming in the USA. If they do, you would have be either pay a daily rate or price/gb or be on a high-end plan. I just want to keep my UK number for banking purposes and occasionally receiving calls.
The good news is that receiving SMS/Calls from the UK while in the US is free. All I need is to turn on my phone when I need to receive said code/call.
If you are in the Pay as you go, you will need to top up every 3 months a minimal amount to keep the SIM active. This can be done online from multiple websites.
If this information came in handy, help me out, use my Lebara referral link to sign up. You will get 50% off the first 6 months of your bill. So thats £2.50/mo for 6 months! There is no network or service out there which will beat this price/quality value.
