Overview:

Vodafone Websessions of Vodafone Germany can be used to access the Internet as follows:

• In Germany for €4.95 for a 24h period (i.e. when a web session is started at 3 in the afternoon it lasts till 3 in the afternoon the next day). 2h are available for €1.95 and 15 mintus for €0.49

• In most European countries for a fee of €14.95 for a 24 hour period
  

• 2009 Summer Promotion: Currently, the national German €4.95 day-flat is not available. Instead, Vodafone offers a week-flat for €9.95 (link with infos in Germany). Promotion (might) expire 31st August 2009.

While limited to 1GB in Germany, Vodafone limits the daily allowance while roaming to 50 MB. After that the user is redirected to a Vodafone web page to activate a new Websession package.

Further restrictions are the banning of VoIP and Instant messengers. However in September 2008, these restrictions were not in place for Skype (used it for voice calls) and Yahoo messenger (used for instant messaging). Both were working fine.

How To Get A SIM:

Vodafone Germany offers a prepaid starter kit €20.- but they are only around €2.- on eBay (Germany, www.ebay.de). Search for "Vodafone CallNow". Note: Only German Vodafone prepaid cards support the WebSession offer.


How to Connect:

The most important thing with the WebSession offer is to use the correct Access Point Name (APN) when connecting. For this offer it is "event.vodafone.de" (the default is usually 'web.vodafone.de'). If a different APN is used other fees will apply for the connection so be careful. After establishing the connection any web page access is redirected to the WebSessions portal page of Vodafone. Here, one can either select to begin a new session or browse the Vodafone.de page for free. Unlike advertised, the only payment option I had was to deduct the price for the WebSession from the prepaid account.

Once opening the web session is confirmed on the portal page the connection is put into transparent mode and full Internet access is possible. Before being forwarded to the initially selected page the portal tries to open a popup window to show the remaining online time. This fails in both Firefox and the Internet Explorer with standard pop-up blocker options enabled. No harm done, the Internet connection works anyway. However, it might be useful to have this information. To allow the pop-up window to open, the pop-up prevention can be manually deactivated in the browsers settings for the portal URL only.

Note that Vodafone uses a compression proxy that compresses pictures in web pages and eMails. While this is good to stay within the 50 MB limits the quality of the compressed pictures is not very high. Here's a description of how the compression can be switched off.

How To Top-Up

The Web Sessions payment screen seems to offer the opportunity [for some SIM cards] to pay by credit card now. However, to keep your SIM card going, you will need to top-up occasionally anyway, and use this credit.

This independent online service allows to top up a GermanVodafone prepaid SIM. The pages itself are in German and English (language switch) but pretty easy to figure out for non natives as well. To top-up a Vodafone SIM card, select "Vodafone CallNow", create an account by typing in your eMail address, specifiy the SIM card's phone number, select the amount to top-up and enter your credit card details. After a minute the selected amount is on the SIM card and can then be used for WebSessions. All quite straight forward and works well.

Supported Roaming Countries:

• Egypt (Vodafone)
• Australia (Vodafone)
• Belgium (Proximus)
• Bulgaria (MobilTel)
• Denmark (TDK)
• Estonia (Elisa)
• Finland (Elisa)
• France (SFR)
• Greece (Vodafone)
• Great Britain (Vodafone)
• Ireland (Vodafone)
• Italy (Vodafone)
• Japan (Softbank)
• Latvia (Latvian)
• Liechtenstein (Mobilkom)
• Lithuania (UAB Bite) --> still on Vodafone's list but I tried in 4/2009 and the landing screen in the web browser says the service is not available in this network.
• Luxemburg (P & T) Malta (Vodafone)
• New Zealand (Vodafone)
• The Netherlands (Vodafone)
• Austria (Mobilkom)
• Poland (Polkomtel)
• Portugal (Vodafone)
• Romania (Mobifon)
• Schweden (Vodafone)
• Switzerland (Swisscom)
• Slovakia (Orange)
• Slovenia (SI.Mobil)
• Spain (Vodafone)
• Czech Republic (Vodafone)
• Turkey (Vodafone)
• Hungary (Vodafone)
• Cyprus (Cytamobile)

Links:

Vodafone Websession page
Websession Tests on Martin's Mobile Technology Page