Cheap roaming calls while overseas? (Flexiroam Giveaway!)

I’ve been blessed in 2011 to have travelled to many places throughout the year – Kota Kinabalu, Singapore, Penang, Hong Kong for a work trip, Malacca for my birthday trip and most recently, my first Euro trip to Venice, Rome and London.

The hustle and bustle of the Hong Kong streets

As a “seasoned traveller”, my habit is to usually research on the best prepaid multisim telco provider in the destination I was planning to travel. Now there are two problems with that :

1. I will not be able to receive incoming calls/texts to my Malaysia number (because I’ve swapped out the simcard).
2. But, if I don’t get a local sim, then I’m faced with a second problem, the ROAMING CHARGES!

When I was in Hong Kong, I bought a local sim for my personal number but I still had to use my work number and keep it active. And of course, it being a weekday, I received calls from clients and the office regarding work. Calls which I had to keep short and sweet.

The damage?

Yes, RM18.90 for 4 MINUTES of calls. That amounts to RM4.61/minute! How crazy is that? Not to mention that the credit limit you set on your phone bill is not applicable when you’re overseas? That means that you will continue racking up bills even though your credit limit is say, RM100. (Note: this applies to Maxis as of May 2011. I’m not sure if its still the case at the time you’re reading this or for other telcos).

Well unluckily for me (coz I found out too late), but luckily for you, there’s a service to solve that problem!

FlexiRoam (www.flexiroam.com) is a service that allows you to receive and make unlimited amount of calls to Malaysia without changing to a new international mobile number.

While you are overseas, calls made to your Malaysian mobile number will be forwarded by FlexiRoam to your foreign mobile SIM card which you can purchase locally at your destination country. This means Malaysian users do not need to inform their contacts of any new international mobile numbers.

Also, unlike services like Skype and the like *coughyeslifecough*, FlexiRoam does NOT require internet access, but leverages on the GSM network and is available in more than 200 countries such as China, Australia, Taiwan, Hong Kong (!), Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore, United Kingdom and India.

And how much is this service? A mere RM10 a DAY for UNLIMITED incoming/outgoing calls!

(Can you tell how unfortunate I feel for paying RM18 for 4 friggin minutes?)

Signing up is FREE! Which means you can sign up, login and explore what FlexiRoam has to offer before committing some moolah. They also have helpful tips on the countries you are travelling to, for instance, did you know that Prepaid SIMs are not widely avaiable in Japan? Yea, I read that from their FAQ.

Also their service is quite flexible based on where and when you are travelling, you can buy passes for the whole duration of your travel, or just 1-2 days when you need it.

Updates: Flexiroam is now available for Singaporean users for SGD10 per day!

======GIVEAWAY======

Now the best part!

FlexiRoam has generously offered to giveaway 10 x RM50 FlexiRoam credit to you, my dear readers. That’s FIVE whole days of unlimited calling while overseas! Call your loved ones while you’re away, call your best friends to make them jealous, call your clients to settle work, call your hotel to make arrangements, call whomever you want.

Good luck!