Mobile Phone & Plan for Calling Within Europe?

Apologies if this post is a duplicate but I've done some searching and can't quite find anything that speaks to my specific request. That being said:

I am traveling for 6 weeks to Austria, Germany Czech Republic, Netherlands, Belgium and France and I will be couchsurfing most of the way. I want to be able to keep in touch via mobile phone with my potential hosts in each country. I would NOT be using the phone to make calls home (back to the US) - this would be specifically for me to call within each country.

Is there a specific phone or plan that would work? I just want to make sure my hosts don't get hit with crazy charges when trying to reach me about lodging. What would be suggestions from The Forum? 1 cell phones that I just swtich out sim cards for for each country? What are the typical costs? Is Skype an option?

Tried to do my own research on this topic and came up with mostly information pertaining to calling home...so if anyone had suggestions, I would appreciate the help!

Best,
Monica

Skype is probably your cheapest option, if the people you are contacting use it. Otherwise I would recommend getting a cheap local sim card. If you have a US sim card and are for example in Germany receiving a call from someone else in Germany they would be charged for the international call and I am 99% sure you would be charged by your network provider back home for receiving it.

Hi.

As already mentioned by fowler9 in *1, Skype could be your best option here.
Roaming simcards only have their built in freebies in the country of purchase.
When you cross the border, you need to start paying for minutes, text and data - or buy another sim.
Plus, of course - some sims only work in the country of purchase. They go off as soon as you leave.
You might do just as well to buy a cheap phone on your travels, that works in every European country.
Best of luck with everything

Thanks everyone - all very helpful. Now if only cellular providers were helpful too...

Never happen mate, ha ha. I just finished working for a major UK network provider. I actually walked out because they are a shower of the proverbial. Treat their customers like poo, treat their staff like poo. I doubt the others are any better in general, that said I've had no problems with my network provider.

Hail what *fowler9 says about service.
I changed from Orange to Tesco awhile back.
Two main reasons for the switch.... Tariffs and Orange customer service. It was just awful.
Tesco's prices sweep the floor with the same package from Orange - for me, anyway.
But it's CS.... Whata bigga mistayka me mayka, thinking Tesco CS would be any better. It's just as bad.
Coverage is good, calls connect faster and texts send quicker too.
Cheaper and better all round for the actual usage, but that's it.

I'm actually with 02 at the minute which his who Tesco use and the network is pretty good, apart from when it completely went down a month or so ago, ha ha. That said they gave me an extra few quid as compensation without me asking for it. Customer Service for all of them is bloody awful, especially where I worked. I've never left a job in my life without having somewhere to go until now. Its not the fault of the staff on the phones either. The most experienced staff had been there for about a year, and this isn't a new company or anything like that. The network provider would make changes to tarifs etc. then tell the call centre staff a month after they told the customers. People would call up complaining, we would tell them they were wrong and we would find out later that they weren't. The customers wanted to speak to a manager, the managers didn't know they were giving out dud advice either.

That was an interesting scenario - the network crashing.
Indeed, Tesco is piggybacked on O2.
My partner is with O2 and got offered a 10% refund for the inconvenience caused.
However Tesco wasn't so quick to do the same.
I phoned its CS and the guy just waffled for about 20 minutes with a 'No' at the end.
Eventually I got an automated text stating a 10% 'Goodwill gesture' was on it's way.
Goodwill gesture indeed.
I just wonder if nobody called its CS, if Tesco would tried to get off with not offering it.

Probably wouldn't have bothered mate. Where I worked you had to be without service for 7 days before you'd get anything, that said it may have been different if the whole network went down. Was sure glad I wasn't working for O2 that day. That said the Blackberry server went down while I was at my former employer, bloody nightmare. Loads of people phoning up and asking how we were going to compensate them, they weren't happy when we told them they would have to contact Blackberry. In that case it really wasn't our fault. Sorry if you've got a Blackberry by the way.... no really, I am sorry, terrible things. Ha ha.

I don't have a Blackberry, but I got my 10% back anyway.

Ha ha, the Blackberry problem was a seperate one from 02 going down. Backberrys need a completely seperate server for their BBM and internet to work and ths is run by RIM who make them. When the server went down we got the blame at the network provider I worked for, it was nothing to do with us, it was RIM. If you get a Blackberry you need to have a special blackberry tarif or an additional bundle (Which you pay more for than any other phone) otherwise all the BBM, e-mail and internet stuff doesn't work. The only other company like this is Apple, the insurance costs twice as much as everyone elses and the warantee lasts half as long and they can never get a bloody signal anyway. I'd just get a Samsung. They make half the parts for the other phone manufacturers anyway. You would have to be mad to get a Blackberry, even RIM are trying to pull away from the consumer market as it is costing them a fortune. They want to focus on business where there is an IT department who can manage to set up the bloody things.