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"Prepaid" Cellular Service Approval, But Won't Be Available Until Next Year
The Autoridad Reguladora de los Servicios Públicos (Aresep) has finally approved rates for "prepaid" cellular service in Costa Rica, where users can purchase prepaid amounts of cellular time of ¢2.500, ¢5.000 and ¢10.000 colones.

The prepaid service will have a time limit of 30, 45 and 60 days and allows for a five day grace period to add more money to the system to continue the use of the number.

The amount of calling time (all incoming calls are not included in the use calculation) are about 62 minutes for the ¢2.500; 135 minutes for ¢5.000; and almost five hours with the ¢10.000. The actual total time will depend if the calls are made during the day - 7:00am to 7:00pm - or evenings when the call rates are lower.

Once the amount has been exhausted and/or the time limit has expired and it has not be renewed, the number will no longer be in use and will be reissued by the Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad (ICE) to a new customer in the future.

Costa Rica is one of the only country in Central America that does not offer prepaid cellular service.

The prepaid system will allow those who cannot afford subscription to regular cellular service and visitors to Costa Rica who can buy the prepaid service for the duration of their stay.

The prepaid service allows a "sim" chip to be installed in a GSM cellular phone and once activated will allow the making and receiving of calls, both local and international, up to its financial limit.

Cellular phones have to be working on the 1800Mhz band that is used in Costa Rica. However, most GSM phones are now multi bands that include the 1800Mhz frequency.

However, when will the service go into effect?

Elberth Durán, a spokesperson for ICE, says that the prepaid service will go into effect in the first half of 2009 when the new 3G network is expected to be installed and working.

Durán added that ICE may provide information on how many lines will be available under the prepaid plan and the exact details of how the service will work, by the end of the year

Hopefully this doesn't take as long.

There's already pre-paid service in costa rica. Just from third parties. I posted in another thread, www.celtrek.com offers pre-paid SIM cards at .37 a minute for local calls and .29 a minute to the US. Not trying to sell them, just find it odd that I mention this twice in one day.. lol

Step 1 (approval) - DONE!
Step 2 (implementation) - we shall see!

The highway to the coast was approved some 30 years ago, right? How many of you have actually driven on it?

Hopefully this doesn't take as long.