US cell ph in France calling another US cell ph in France

[gerryex]

I’ve read some of the posts and I think I know what to do but wanted to post this summary to make sure. Assume:

My Cell: 813 – 222 – 3333
Other Cell: 813 – 444 – 5555

Both have their US SIM cards and are roaming in France.

For me to call back to the US: 00 – 1 – area code – ph number

For me to call other cell (both in France): 00 – 1 – 813 – 444 – 5555

For me to call a local ph in France: 00 – 33 – number in France
OR dial just the local number

For someone (from France) to call me: 00 – 1 – 813 – 222 – 3333

For someone to call me from US: 1 – 813 – 222 – 3333

If all the above is correct then it look like while my cell is roaming in France, for outgoing calls it behaves as if its a French number, but for incoming calls it acts as its regular US number. Is that right?

Thanks,
Gerry

[admin]

Hi Gerry,
You seem to perfectly understand how international roaming works and your conclusion is correct: phone is local for outgoing and US for incoming.
Enjoy your stay in France!

[gerryex]

Thanks very much! Until you do some research it all seems to be very confusing and while its easy to find the different country codes I couldn’t find many references to determine HOW to use the codes. Once I could see that the roaming cell acts local for outgoing and is still US for incoming, its easy!

Thanks again,
Gerry

[gerryex]

Follow up question!

For most European phone numbers, at least those I’ve seen for France and the UK, they begin with (0). For example: (0) 3 44 55 66 77. I found a reference that said the (0) is a “trunk” designation. But the question is do you dial it all the time and if not when?

Thanks,
Gerry

[admin]

The zero trunk code is used for national calls. When in France you could also call locally by entering French phone numbers in their national dialing format. Example: French cell number: 06 ???? ????. You can either use 00 33 6 ???? ???? or 06 ???? ???? to reach the same French cell when dialing from within France using a mobile phone. Normally you should dial the latter, but wireless carriers set up their networks to recognize both dialing formats.

[gerryex]

Thanks for the quick reply!

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
The zero trunk code is used for national calls . . .
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

So does that mean if I were living in France and was dialing a French number I would always use the 0 trunk code? And it looks like if you dial that same number using a country’s exit code and the country code for France (ex: 00 33) then you do NOT use the 0 trunk code? And finally is that why its usually displayed as (0) with a phone number signifying that its used sometimes as described above.

I’m learning more and more but there are still parts of this international dialing that kind of confusing! Lastly, what is the purpose of the 0 trunk code?

THANKS FOR ALL YOUR HELP,
Gerry

[admin]

Gerry,
You are correct, if you were living in France you would have to use 0 before all phone numbers. In fact you would consider 0 as part of the phone number.

A trunk code is normally used for long distance calls. The US and Canada also use a trunk code – it is 1. When dialing state to state calls you must use 1 + area code + local number. In this case 1 is the US trunk or long distance code. There is a bit of confusion here since the US country code is also 1. So when dialing to the US from abroad you drop the trunk code (1) and dial the country code which is also 1.

One other thing: France has a so called closed dialing plan which means that there are no area codes or local numbers – all calls are dialed nationally using the national dialing format starting with 0.

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