No RSL whilst abroad

Hi All, with an impending trip and SOTA in Hungary i thought id be sure and check in with ofcom the correct callsign to use whilst abroad as my ‘home callsign’ has the regional locator (M for Scotland). I was sure when i fist got my full call it would have been HA/MM0TAI, but i wanted to be sure and check. Anyway they have replied today with HA/M0TAI, ie. do not use the RSL.Ive been out of the radio game for a little while and guess things have been updated. Just a heads up for anyone else like myself that didn’t know this.

73

Adrian
MM0TAI

Hi Adrian,

Nice to hear you are back into SOTA again and enjoy your trip in Hungry. A few yours ago Ofcom decided to drop using RSL when operating abroad even if your home callsign has an RSL in it. I personally don’t agree with Ofcom decision to drop RSLs when operation abroad as I think operating abroad should involved using your home callsign.

Jimmy M0HGY (formally 2E0EYP and M3EYP)

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My callsign is M0FMF, Adrian’s callsign is M0TAI.

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You don’t have a home callsign, you have a callsign.

Your callsign does not have an RSL, it is something you have to add dependant on your location.

This is all made very clear in the current licence documents and in the Ofcom guidance to the licence document.

There was the argument, perfectly valid IMO, that your callsign was whatever it said on your licence document.

Anyway, it is what it is, doesn’t really makes much difference - just go with the rules and requirements as they are. They’ll probably alter again at some future point!

Indeed, and current licence documents don’t have an RSL - they have a marker for where you should place an RSL if one is required by your current location.

I have plenty of such docments with M0FMF and MM0FMF and M(M)0FMF.

Ah, you are interpreting the Jimmy was inferring a “thing” known as a ‘home callsign’. He could have simply been using ‘home’ as an adjective to indicate the callsign that one would use from the home QTH.

Do current licence documents issued to stations in GD, GJ, GI, GM, GU all display the pure callsign without the secondary locator then? They always used to show, dare I say it, the home callsign.

Anyway, dunt affect me. CCL.

I went onto the ofcom website this week to reprint my license to take with me, in previous years it had MM0TAI, now it has M#0TAI.

I do have a copy from a while ago that they got wrong and gave me ME0TAI

Hi Jimmy, yeah back to SOTA, i was a bit shocked to see I’ve had a 7 year gap. Anyway good to be back and getting out and about on the summits again. Im in the process of getting back onto HF portable again. Catch you on the bands again sometime perhaps.

Adrian
MM0TAI

They do indeed!

and it does affect you- because if you printed a copy of your current licence from the Ofcom site (to get the current validation date for example) it would say M#1EYP

The reason why it was bizarre was the rules didn’t consider stations operating outwhith England. MM0FMF means the UK station M0FMF currently operating from within Scotland. Likewise GW4VPX means the UK station G4VPX currently operating in Wales.

What does HB9/MM0FMF/P mean? A UK station operating in Scotland operating in Switzerland ? It can’t be both as it says I can be in 2 separate places at the same. Schrodinger’s FMF in effect!

See it’s a nonsense to have ever included the RSL when abroad and I have done so under protest in the past because “the rules is the rules”.

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It totally makes sense in my mind, you can’t be in scotland (or your required RSL) and abroad also at the same time. The only downside is it makes the art of confirming qsl’s digitally or by card slightly more challenging.

Above all else the correct call sign to use wherever you are operating is whatever the local authority says it is. I recall a few months ago a GM station operating in HB0. The HB0 authority told them to use the RSL!

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Yeah it’s probably worth checking in with the licensing board you plan to travel to and see if they have any specific requirements to follow.

What’s the RSL for Lichtenstein? The docs only show M, W, D, I, J, G.

Perhaps I should be HB0/MHB00FMF/P when operating from there! :slight_smile:

And we should remember the fun Paul W6PNG had last time over here in the UK. He was signing M/W6PNG and some bright spark told him he should sign MW6PNG as an M6 in Wales. Paul did explain he’s a UK expat with a US call and English accent. And was in England not Wales!

Only the UK civil service could come up with such a convoluted scheme.

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I heard about an interesting one last night. GM0RML and G0MRL in qso mobile, going opposite direction cross border between GM and G. As you can imagine it got messy with the callsign exchanges when both had swapped their RSL’s

I was just referring the callsign that are started on your licence document. Although I personally don’t agree that you don’t use RSLs abroad, I do respect Ofcoms rule on this.

I am not as active in SOTA as much as I use to be Adrian, but will be in Lanzarotte in April and planning some trips to Cornwall and Snowdonia later this year. I normally operate on 2m fm from SOTA summits, but I can almost guarantee that I will be on HF and Lanzarotte and likely Cornwall and maybe even Snowdonia so hopefully work you maybe summit to summit on HF later this year.

Jimmy M0HGY

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Ok Jimmy, have safe travels and yes hopefully a s2s will work out for us.

Cheers

Adrian

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Can I ask what RSL means

73, Hans DL/PB2T