Phone calling using our cell phones in France

We just came from Paris. Both my husband and I are with T-Mobile and I added the 15GB international plan. We just called each other like we normally do which is the 10 digit phone number that includes the area code.

Right, you should not need to do anything special if you are both using international plans.

But at worst, you can easily add the country code using a + followed by the country code. E.g., to call the Rick Steves office, you'd dial +1 425 771 8303 (hold down the 0 key on the dial pad to get a +). Few people use the old format prefix (011, etc.) - they mostly use a + in front of the number. You'll see numbers almost always written that way.

agree, just was in France and my wife and I had International Phone plans on our cell phones an called each other normally with no additional codes/numbers

On my phone - iPhone11 with T-Mobile coverage - I have the option to select "Dial Assist" in Settings > Phone. By enabling "Dial Assist" the phone "automatically determines the correct international or local prefix when dialing." This worked when I was in Greece calling Canada.

We both have US cell phones

Where the phones are from is immaterial. What is important is where your SIMs are from. If both your phones have US SIMs, then while in France, to call one another, use the international dialing scheme, 011 or +1 (for N American SIMs), then area code + 7 digit local exchange number. However, to make calls to French numbers, while connected to a French network, you do not need to dial 00 or +33, simply dial the 10-digit number starting with ¨0¨. Note: emergency numbers: 15 - SAMU (ambulance), 17 - Police, and 18 - Fire are dialed without prefix no matter what type of SIM you have.

What is possible, and is done often, is to use a French SIM in your US phone. This makes it much easier for French phones to call you without either of you incurring international charges.

All of this is greatly simplified if you sore all numbers with ¨+¨ such as ¨+1¨ for N American numbers or ¨+33¨ for French numbers. Phone numbers stored this way will always dial correctly, no matter from where the call is placed.

When we were in Europe the last few times, I was able to call US numbers (like my spouse's, or family back home) just by looking in "recent calls" and selecting the person to call back. Smart phone figures it out.

YTravel you solved a problem for us today, thanks! We have been traveling for two months and today, for the first time, I needed to call my husband when we were on separate tasks in a city. I could not complete the call! Luckily we found each other, but we went down a rabbit hole trying to figure out the problem as we could call each other over WiFi but not the telephone network. Our phones insisted on adding the +1.

Luckily I had seen this topic earlier in the day but dismissed it as we thought we just had to call each other “as normal,” like at home. Your answer caused me to look at the settings on my Samsung S20-5G and I found a similar setting that once unchecked allowed calls to be completed. Hubby’s older Samsung S9+ does not have the same setting option but worked once my setting was changed. FYI, we are on T-Mobile International Magenta Max plan.

Even when some of our party has international calling plans, we just use WhatsApp anyway. Works for everyone in the party, some with Orange sim cards, some with international US plans.