With Saudi Arabia being an international destination outside the EU, roaming charges will apply which are exceedingly expensive whatever network you’re on in the UK. I’m on GiffGaff and the inclusive minutes, texts and data you can buy as part of a rolling pay as you go credit, whilst they can be used as normal within the EU will not cover the KSA.
Because of this, it’s always recommended to buy a SIM card when you land so that you can use data/minutes as required. I have some friends who did not purchase this as they were comfortable using the hotel wifi as and when needed but as I post on SnapChat quite frequently on travelling, as well as navigation requirements, data is quite key for me when travelling.
At Jeddah airport or any commercial places for that matter across Makkah/Madinah you will normally find SIM card operator stalls. This is quite a large commercial business in KSA from what I hear. These stalls were right before the exit and there were stalls for Zain, and Salam which are two big operators in the KSA. There is a queuing system and line for each stall so I can imagine it gets quite busy and there are a lot of travellers purchasing these sims when they land.
I asked for a SIM card and the guy at the desk who spoke English referred me to the leaflet on the desk with the Visitor deals. There’s a basic data package that gives you 4GB of data and then there were 3 other packages increasing in price as well as data, minutes and texts.
I settled for the second package which was the Visitor 60 package which gives you 20GB of data, 150 inclusive minutes that can be used for international calls and some texts (I never used texts so can’t remember).
Now to purchase a SIM card in Saudi Arabia, the security controls are much more stringent. On top of providing all your details they take your fingerprints as well. Once again they struggled to get mine. For a period of half an hour and switching fingers nothing seemed to be working. The guy at the desk requested help from a colleague of his but still no luck and he said the system doesn’t seem to be working even though I knew that it was a problem with taking my finger prints.
In the end from what I can gather he cancelled the transaction and started anew using his own fingerprints and fake names. This was very kind of him to be fair as he was taking a little risk if I look at it from his shoes. He was also very helpful to put the sim into my phone by removing the SIM tray and inserting the SIM into the SIM card 2 tray on my Samsung Galaxy which is dual sim.
Immediately I got the notifications and the SMS messages from the Zain network that everything was now connected and the Welcome to Saudi Arabia text. So all is good. It was a little more pricier than what I had found online but at the airport, the prices are generally a bit more steeper so keep this in mind.
Security at Jeddah airport is quite standard to be honest. Actually it was much easier for me as I never got questioned like I do within Europe or put into a room for questioning as has happened a few times already! Initial impressions were that the staff were a bit unfriendly but to be honest, that’s not really fair. It was very early in the morning and security at airports with so many pilgrims is a big ask so I can understand why you wouldn’t be in a mood to welcome everyone. Security at Jeddah was pretty standard to be honest and nothing unusual.
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