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CTExcel thoughts

janmatant

Casual Member
Hi.
Im new to this forum, so ill introduce myself quickly.
Im Jan, Im interested in telecommunications and such, especially mobile networks.
I also collect SIM cards, just for the physical designs, or sometimes to test out roaming and such.

I recently ordered 2 CTExcel SIMs. There seems to be a slightly old thread on here about it but noone actually tested it there and I thought it would be a better idea to make a new thing,

It seems to have first been a thing around the early 2010's as a MVNO for Chinese in the UK, which it has continued to be in contrast to something like CMLink which now has expanded to a general UK audience.
The website was always ctexcel.com even when they had the "biz" suffix
EE document about the launch

1726480291458.webp
An old video showing something related to the network

People in the old thread seemed to not trust the company very much.
Probably a good thing, I gone ahead though.
China Telecom is a large and established company. There is of course a chance of some sort of Chinese government tracking or such involved, but I didn't personally let that bother me.

I placed my order for the first sim, 4.90 with 3GB of UK data (1.5 of that usable in the EU too) on the 8th of September.
It came on the 13th, the cancelation of the stamp said it was sent on the 12th.
It's interesting they still use stamps instead of some sort of meter or prepaid postage label, CMLink does the same thing.
1726481256057.webp

As visible, all text on the Starter pack is in Chinese. This continues to the inside, even though I ordered mine on the English language portion of the website (which often doesn't work very well or just puts random Chinese text or errors)

After I ordered that one, it turned out that if you follow a link on their instagram, you can get a "free" SIM (which actually costs a pound, similarly to CMLink). That part of the site is completely in Chinese. I managed to still order one using some google translate.

I'll say more about actual usage in a response, as I can't add any more attachments here.
 
You're braver than I am!

Please do try to put the SIM through it's paces and find out as much as you can about how it works to try and keep the spreadsheet up to date:

 
Thanks :)

Here are my experiences.

As we know it is an EE mvno. It actually uses the same template for its SIM as other small EE MVNO's like Popit or Boshhh.
ctcompare.webp
Upon putting it into my Pixel 7, it connected normally, at first just showing "EE".
To my surprise, as it isn't a given for these sorts of SIMs, it later said "CTExcel - EE"
A bit strange, as the "Operator - Operator" format is usually used for roaming in another country, for example "Play - Talk Home" "Orange - ASDA Mobile"
"T-Mobile #5GBardziej - mt:s" "Beeline - KYIVSTAR"

I couldn't get the data working on the Pixel. I tried the APN settings buried somewhere on the website but nothing.
I got a 2 texts straight away from the number 888:

Google translate:
Thank you for your purchase. You can send text message 'BAL' to 888 to check your balance.

and


Google translate:
"Your mobile phone card 07536174677 will usually be activated within 10 minutes! You can follow the official WeChat public account [China Telecom CTExcel EU] for business processing and real-time balance inquiry, or call 888 customer service for consultation.
I sent the BAL text, and this is what I got:


Translated:
You do not have any balance. The package includes UN49_2024 and is valid until 14/10/2024 00:00. You also have:
- 499 mins British voice
- 0 minutes
- 500 SMS UK SMS
- 1.50 GB UK data
- 1.50 GB UK + EU traffic

Eventually after I put it into an iPhone I got the data to work.
It just says "CTExcel" without the EE.
Nothing too special I guess, it has VoWiFi ("EE WiFiCall") and seems to have VoLTE as well.
Couldn't test 5G quite yet as it wouldnt connect in the Pixel and I honestly couldn't be bothered troubleshooting it 😅 The iPhone was a 6S.
I have some other phone with 5G but currently using it for something else, Ill update after testing that.
Speedtest just detected the provider as EE.

Numbers all seem to start with 0753617, with only the last 4 digits varying in the 2 that I ordered. Not surprising as it doesnt seem to target anything more than Chinese expats, residents and tourists in the UK. There is as I mentioned some English on the website if you switch to it, but I can't imagine they get much non-Chinese users at all.

I did also get this interesting SMS a bit later:


Translated
[Security Reminder] Recently, criminals have impersonated the embassy, immigration office, express delivery, public security 96111 or telecommunications customer service to conduct phone fraud. China Telecom CTExcel would like to remind you: We will not leak user information, nor will we proactively ask for sensitive information such as passports, ID cards, bank cards, etc. Please remain vigilant and do not disclose personal information. If you encounter a suspicious call, please verify it through official channels, beware of fraud, and protect your property!
I did hear CMLink has had similar scam and spam issues.

Not sure what else I should test, let me know. Heres some images.

1726491265674.webp

I had to remove and change some elements like the Chinese as the system kept flagging this as spam.
 
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Not sure what else I should test, let me know. Heres some images.
Band 20 Signal availability would be a good one to confirm if it's available or not on their SIMs.

Other things would be missed call alerts (If the phone is switched off or SIM removed and you call the number do you get a text to say you missed a call?)

Can you place a 3-Way call with their SIMs?

Can you get HD Call quality over VoLTE? (Don't call out to any number on the Three network to test this)

Can you get visual voicemail on iPhone (I highly doubt this works)

Do you get an IPv6 address when browsing the web or is it just IPv4?

Finally, if you text PAC to 65075 What are the first three characters of the code? I suspect it will be TSL. (If you don't actually want to move the number elsewhere or close the account, simply don't give this code to anyone and your SIM should remain active. Requesting a PAC doesn't close an account but rather using a PAC does)

The above will help to add CTExcel to the spreadsheet I linked above thart compares all the different brands and features.

[Security Reminder] Recently, criminals have impersonated the embassy, immigration office, express delivery, public security 96111 or telecommunications customer service to conduct phone fraud. China Telecom CTExcel would like to remind you: We will not leak user information, nor will we proactively ask for sensitive information such as passports, ID cards, bank cards, etc. Please remain vigilant and do not disclose personal information. If you encounter a suspicious call, please verify it through official channels, beware of fraud, and protect your property!
I did hear CMLink has had similar scam and spam issues.
Yes. This is the problem with SIMs that all get issued with the same number prefix. They get targeted with specific scam and spam calls. CMLink fixed it by getting new SIMs that all have random EE phone numbers assigned to them at the time of activation now, rather than them all being pre-allocated the same range. No more unwanted calls on their new SIM cards.

If CTExcel is targeted as badly as the original CMLink number range was the calls will be relentless. I remember one of their early SIMs arriving with the voicemail box completely full already with chinese language scam messages with things like DHL parcels that need admin and customs charges paid prior to delivery and number spoofed calls that appeared to come from the embassy. Again though, as soon as another number was ported in to the SIM that all stopped.
 
Upon putting it into my Pixel 7, it connected normally, at first just showing "EE".
To my surprise, as it isn't a given for these sorts of SIMs, it later said "CTExcel - EE"
A bit strange, as the "Operator - Operator" format is usually used for roaming in another country, for example "Play - Talk Home" "Orange - ASDA Mobile"
"T-Mobile #5GBardziej - mt:s" "Beeline - KYIVSTAR".
For my Talk Home SIM it can show as:

Talk.Home - EE
Talk Home
Talk.Home - Talk Home
EE

Depending on the phone.

When roaming It's: EE - whatever roaming carrier. At least on my S23.
 
CTExcel is targeted as badly as the original CMLink number range was the calls will be relentless. I remember one of their early SIMs arriving with the voicemail box completely full already with chinese language scam messages with things like DHL parcels that need admin and customs charges paid prior to delivery and number spoofed calls that appeared to come from the embassy. Again though, as soon as another number was ported in to the SIM that all stopped.
Now I feel a bit guilty, any scammers that didn't know the number range before will have very easy access to it now on this forum.
Oh well.

Out of curiosity, when/what was the old CMLink one though? I have a number that's quite old and came on an older design SIM (got a replacement now with the same number) so it would be cool to have an "OG" number 😆

As to the things to test-

Band 20 Signal availability would be a good one to confirm if it's available or not on their SIMs.
First one I'm not quite sure about, I'll Google it and try figure
Can you place a 3-Way call with their SIMs?
Also not too sure about this one, also does "SIMs" imply 3 seperate CTExcel SIMs or just one and the rest on other networks
Can you get HD Call quality over VoLTE? (Don't call out to any number on the Three network to test this)
Not sure what too look out for but I'll try,
Can you get visual voicemail on iPhone (I highly doubt this works)
I'll Google that as I'm much more of an android user than apple.

The rest seem quite self explanatory, I'll update as I test.

I saw the spreadsheet also seemed to have a few categories for roaming. Some of them I don't seem to quite understand, however I am going abroad in a few weeks (Spain, but in a location where if there is any Tropo or propagation you can often get Algerian networks) so I could try some of those out as well.
For my Talk Home SIM it can show as:

Talk.Home - EE
Talk Home
Talk.Home - Talk Home
EE

Depending on the phone.

When roaming It's: EE - whatever roaming carrier. At least on my S23.
Yeah I get that too for Now and TalkHome, for a while also Lyca and such, it seems to be a thing on cheaper EE mvnos.
It did actually show Talk Home - Roaming carrier recently though;
Screenshot_20240916-192807.webp
 
Hi! I've done some testing.

In all honesty i've done some research but I cannot figure out how to see if band 20 is available. It kept saying band 1 /

Unfortunately it doesn't seem to have missed call alerts. Perhaps something you can set up but everything on 888 (the number they tell you to call for everything) is all in Chinese. Apparently you can switch the language through 888 to English, but to do that I need to know Chinese too 😅 It speaks too fast for Google translate to understand too. I'll try ask my Chinese pal to translate for me if I remember..

HD Call quality on VoLTE - Yes 🫡

3 Way-call - Never tested this before. On android, while calling one number I clicked add call but that seemingly just put one on hold and connected me to another. Not sure if that's whats meant. I remember my old o2 SIM wouldn't work with hold (or maybe it was giffgaff or Lyca... not sure) so thats something I suppose.
I tried clicking "merge" which is probably what you mean, but that just gave me an error so nope.

PAC Code - Yep, starts with TSL.

iP: iPV4 only seemingly.

Visual Voicemail on iPh- Probavly not, but again I couldn't get any services like voicemail set up since everything is in Chinese ((

Hope this is useful )))


1726684138280.webp


1726684291754.webp
 
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but I cannot figure out how to see if band 20 is available
Do you know whether you've got any 4G cells with a TAC ending in 0 through CTExcel? That might be easier.

You can use an app like NetMonster to see what cells you're connected to if you aren't already.

I suspect it does with VoLTE and HD Voice but we'll find out soon.
 
When you're calling 888 listen out for something that sounds like ying-gaw or ying-gou which is the word in Mandarin for English.

In case it helps the equivalent word for Chinese is jong-gaw which might be mentioned in another option.

Numbers in Mandarin are

Eee for 1
Rrr or Arh for 2 (or maybe Liang which is a counting word for 2)
San for 3
Sir for 4
Wooo for 5
Leeu for 6
Chi for 7
Bah for 8
Jeeo for 9
Ling for 0

There's an official way to write Chinese in pinyin but the above is my phonetic way to describe the sounds.
 
Do you know whether you've got any 4G cells with a TAC ending in 0 through CTExcel? That might be easier.

You can use an app like NetMonster to see what cells you're connected to if you aren't already.

I suspect it does with VoLTE and HD Voice but we'll find out soon.
How does one do that with NetMonster installed?
 
How does one do that with NetMonster installed?
You should see your logged cells in a page and if the 4G TAC ends in 0 (on band 20 or 28 or on some micro cell deployments) on EE (using your CTExcel SIM), you should be able to identify whether it has B20 access.

Sorry about the screenshot being heavily redacted, but it's the 5 digit number next to the eNB:sector.

Screenshots attached are a EE micro cell which broadcasts no 2G with the TAC ending in 0 and a rooftop site with EE having a TAC ending in 0 on a B20 cell with a B3 cell on the same site having a TAC ending in 1 (the other cell on that image is an O2 B20 cell).

1000024774.webp

1000024775.webp
 
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