Secretary moving to Saudi to Work

As regards internet, you have two choices: dial-up or broadband. The dial-up is free, but is so slow that very few people still choose to use it. Broadband (either ADSL or fiber optic, depending where you live) costs US$40 per month. They will always give you a conservative estimate at orientation and indeed it might take 6 weeks but could easily take less - we had a new Secretary join our Dept in November and it took her less than two weeks to get her Internet working.

Your UK phone SIM will work here but as Lucy says, the costs would probably be too high to want to use it for too long. The problem is that you can't get a local SIM (at least not in your own name) until you've got your iqama. I believe they also tell you to allow up to 6 weeks for your iqama to be issued but once more, as with the Internet it often takes less time - sometimes less than two weeks. If I recall, it took our new secretary around 10 days to get her iqama.

There are lots of things to do in your spare time - these can be group activities or individual pursuits - it's entirely up to you.

If you haven't already looked at it, I would check out the video "Open Your Eyes - Saudi Aramco" on the recruitment website at:

www.jobsataramco.eu/19/lifestyle ... munity.htm

This gives good examples of the kind of recreational activities that are available.

Bear in mind that this is a recruitment video and designed primarily to showcase all the benefits of working here.

Thanks for the reply GroveWanderer. I am in the same position as the above girls but like you say I suppose each person/case is different and things happen at different stages like in the recruitment process. Hopefully we will be lucky and be able to get our internet and iqama quite quickly!

Don't forget girls I'll be there before you leaving on the 2nd March so you'll have me to help you when you arrive. I might be left to figure it all out for myself :shock:

Just think of it as a little adventure...it will no doubt be scary at first & we will all get homesick but once we settle in I'm sure we will be fine.

I'd also just like to thank everyone who replies on this forum it has been a great help. Well I'm off to source some 110v appliances if its possible....just wish we could have been on 220v then that way I could have shipped all my belongings!

Hi:
You didn't say where you are planning on living in KSA...but think that this may apply most everywhere.

I was able to purchase a new Nokia basic phone without a contract at a kiosk outside of the Hyper Panda in DHA for 88 SAR. I carry a locked I-phone in the US with no international roaming capability. This seemed like a good option...and cheap!

I then purchased a pre-paid SIM from STC in the Almujama building in the DHA camp. That was around 25 SAR and I believe that it included 25 SAR of pre-paid air time. I had to show my temporary ID as a contractor. I don't have an igama and apparently didn't need it for pre-paid, non contract use. Minutes are easily obtained from the commissary. I also purchased a STC scratch card from a gas station convenience store. 1 SAR goes a long way for local calls. Used most of mine up for international calls back home to the US.

That seemed to be the best solution for my short term visit...and when I return in the future. Hope it helps you.

The board does not log you out. Occasionally, they do work on the forum, but you wouldn't be able to log on if that were the case.

Many people in DHA have been having router/modem problems and it has been disconnecting/reconnecting on a constant basis. These have to be replaced to fix the problem.

The board most definitely does log you out. And I'm not the only one who has noticed this. Other people have already mentioned it in the Bug Reports forum.

What typically happens is that if you log on and then become inactive for a while, when you come back to the screen, you are no longer logged in.

For instance, sometimes I am composing a reply but get interrupted. When I come back, 10 or 15 mins later, my response is still visible on the screen but when I click on Submit, I get a message saying that you have to be logged on to post replies (or words to that effect).

On avee, I would say this happens to me at least once every session. It is not a modem/router problem as all other sites I am logged onto at the same time (including other phpBB sites) continue to work as normal.

Yep, that's happened to me a few times as well, and I gave up because I didn't want to type my whole post again. Now I know to copy my text before I hit "Submit," in case it says I need to log in again - then I can just paste it and try again.