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Bad Experience with TIM SIM Cards

Posted by on

On our recent trip to Italy, Switzerland, France, and England, I bought SIM cards at the TIM kiosk at Fiumicino airport, Rome.

We had 3 iPhones, and were supposed to get data but generally only one of them every got data. Mine worked in italy, then stopped working when we left Italy at which point my daughter's started working! My wife's briefly got data towards the end of our time in Italy. This kind of thing happens quite a bit with SIM cards but the big lesson learned for me is to never get SIM cards from a company that has no English-speaking customer support. I simply could not communicate with anyone to address this - very frustrating. (Well, I was able to go into a TIM store in Rome and they were able to help some.)

Question: does anyone know of a way to communicate with TIM customer service in English? Really, I would like my money back.

Thanks

Posted by
5687 posts

I always advise people to make sure the SIM card works before they leave the mobile store, if at all possible, to avoid problems like these. In the past, I've had a few SIM issues before leaving the store - and got them fixed before walking out.

I don't know if TIM has English customer support or not. I suspect Vodafone does; their Dutch website does (online chat), if you register for an account on the Vodafone website. I see the Vodafone IT website also allows one to create an account there, so I'm guessing they might offer English-language chat support, too.

But I wouldn't be holding my breath expecting a refund at this point.

Posted by
3272 posts

Just curious which service did you get? Was it the TIM Tourist card?

Posted by
11744 posts

I commiserate. Even speaking (some) Italian I feel over my head with anything technical. Heck, it can be hard to understand cell phone plans in English!

We got lucky and found a guy at TIM in Milano that spoke English and upon learning we were going to Switzerland as part of our travels, he sold us an add-on service that (should) work there. We will see in about 10 days if he was right.

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