Hello Fellow travelers, Have any of you have had difficulty in trying to recharge Orange (France) European SIM card from US or Canada? Myself and my wife are traveling to europe (Germany, Switzerland) starting this weekend. We have an Orange SIM card, previously purchased and with a valid number as well as an account. I have been trying to recharge the same with a variety of Credit and debit cards but without success. There is no option for payment through Paypal in this instance. After unsuccessful attempt at recharging, I get an email message from Orange Travel (France) that my order has been cancelled. Have any other fellow travelers who own Orange SIM card faced this issue?
Thanks for any helpful advice regarding this issue!
Posted by
5 posts
Timely post - just had these very same issues trying to recharge my daughter's Orange account while she is in Europe. After 3 days of trying we finally got this to work.......
top-up.orange.com
There are several Orange top-up sites - this one worked for the "Holiday" SIM. The other sites would not work and resulted in us setting up new accounts, registering the number, new passwords, trying to pay various methods (failure)......round and round we went.......this site seemed to work and took our MasterCard. (Our visa wouldn't work but MasterCard did.)
I hope this works for you as well! Happy travels :)
Posted by
L'Occitanie, France
10674 posts
Some credit card processors in Europe don't process US cards online, only in the store.
If the above link does work for you, too, please come back to report your success. That information would be useful to others.
Posted by
City of Seattle
1959 posts
I've used Orange phone chips many times, get a new number every summer. If I recall correctly the phone number expires and is returned to the pool after the chip sits dormant for some set number of months? I think this is correct but don't rely on it..
In any case you can just get a new card and number and good to go.
Posted by
OP
Eastern Canada
68 posts
Thanks for all the suggestions. My account with Orange travel Europe appears active and the current phone number is valid as per the account profile. I have been trying to purchase the coverage for 14 day Holiday program on their website. I will certainly post again if my attempts at recharging the SIM card is successful!
Posted by
TX, USA
4894 posts
I have been unsuccessful at getting mine registered so I can keep the number. It keeps telling me the number and sim number don’t match - but both are what they sent me. If anyone has insight on that, let me know. I have tried customer service but after a first response telling me to send screenshots (which I did twice), they no longer answer.
Posted by
Myrtle Beach, USA
12315 posts
I've used the Orange Sim that's designed for travel. That may not be the same SIM you're using; they have different programs. Mine was good for 14 days. My memory is a little vague. Even when I was in France, it seemed like I had to stop by an Orange boutique to extend mine. And I couldn't do it until I was close to (or at) day 14. All of my trips were 17-21 days, so I always had to top it off once. Then I just let it expire when it was done with the second 14-day period.
My experience has been the SIM card can be renewed for a limited time (one year if I recall correctly). My last Orange SIM was back in 2018, long past any chance to renew. Not sure if a time limit is your issue.
Good luck with yours.