SIM card for overseas travel

[charita101]

I am going to Australia soon for 3 weeks, with my Droid-2. Is it possible to buy a SIM card in Australia and use it in my phone utilizing the local rates, which presumably will be cheaper. The Global Plan that I presently have will cost me $0.99 per minute, which will quickly mount up. Anybody out there to advise me? Many thanks.

[silver6055]

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charita101 wrote:

I am going to Australia soon for 3 weeks, with my Droid-2. Is it possible to buy a SIM card in Australia and use it in my phone utilizing the local rates, which presumably will be cheaper. The Global Plan that I presently have will cost me $0.99 per minute, which will quickly mount up. Anybody out there to advise me? Many thanks.

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Droid 2 Global I hope!   If so, yes. 

You will need to get your phone unlocked. Call *611 from the phone or 800-922-0204 and ask for Global Services.  To unlock the phone you need to have had service on your line for at least 60 days and  your account must be in good standing for at least 60 days (and you haven't unlocked another phone on this line for at least 10 months).

They will give you one or two unlock codes.

IMPORTANT:  If at all possible: if you have another SIM here, or can borrow one (even AT&T or T-Mobile) from someone, put the SIM in the phone.  This will generate the prompt for unlock, and you can enter the code and confirm that it works.   If it doesn't, call Global Services again.  Don't be put off by statements "You can only do this when abroad" that is just not true.  The SIM won't work, but the unlocking process will!

It's important because there have been several cases where the unlock code didn't work, and people only found this out when they were out of the country, and were unable to get the SIM working.

Once you have the SIM, switch to GSM mode.  For data, you may need to set up the APNs manually, get the values from the network provider of the SIM.

[charita101]

Thanks, silver6055 for your very informed reponse. Yes I do have the Global model Droid-2. The suggested procedure seems complicated to my simplistic mind, as I don't even know what an APN is, nor do I know anything about unlocking the phone. I may end up just buying a cheap $20 phone in Australia and just pay for the minutes usage. Sad, I know, but.... 

[silver6055 · Accepted solution]

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charita101 wrote:

Thanks, silver6055 for your very informed reponse. Yes I do have the Global model Droid-2. The suggested procedure seems complicated to my simplistic mind, as I don't even know what an APN is, nor do I know anything about unlocking the phone. I may end up just buying a cheap $20 phone in Australia and just pay for the minutes usage. Sad, I know, but.... 

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OK, sorry if I made it sound complex, unlocking really isn't.   Just phone global services and they will give you a code.

When you put the SIM in the phone, it will prompt you for the code, and you just enter it.  If all goes well (and it usually will!) then your phone will be unlocked and you can use any SIM card you chose. 

The APN just tells the phone how to connect to the internet.  Often this will be read from the SIM, it's only if that doesn't happen you have to enter it manually.   You don't need to worry about the APN if you are just making calls or texting (which is probably all you could do with a $20 phone anyway!)

[charita101]

silver6055: thank you for persevering with me. I contacted Verizon and they gave me a 8-digit Code Number for locking/unlocking the phone. On second thoughts, it does look as if it is a straight-forward procedure. I will do it as soon as I buy the local Australian SIM card. Again, thanks for your help.

Charles.

[sittib11]

if we are planning a lengthy european trip over several countries from Budapest to France next year, how does this work buying sim card in local area?  Would it be one for each country or is a Europe SIM card offered?   We used your SIM and global service 4.99 plan at .99 per minute and used it sparingly, turning off our data while overseas to lower costs, and it worked well when used.

[sittib11]

if we are planning a lengthy european trip over several countries from Budapest to France next year, how does this work buying sim card in local area?  Would it be one for each country or is a Europe SIM card offered?   We used your SIM and global service 4.99 plan at .99 per minute and used it sparingly, turning off our data while overseas to lower costs, and it worked well when used.

[sittib11]

if we are planning a lengthy european trip over several countries from Budapest to France next year, how does this work buying sim card in local area?  Would it be one for each country or is a Europe SIM card offered?   We used your SIM and global service 4.99 plan at .99 per minute and used it sparingly, turning off our data while overseas to lower costs, and it worked well when used.

[silver6055]

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sittib11 wrote:

if we are planning a lengthy european trip over several countries from Budapest to France next year, how does this work buying sim card in local area?  Would it be one for each country or is a Europe SIM card offered?   We used your SIM and global service 4.99 plan at .99 per minute and used it sparingly, turning off our data while overseas to lower costs, and it worked well when used.

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If you plan to use only a very small amount of data (so as you say, turning it off except when using Wifi) the Verizon SIM is OK.  (You may want to purchase one of the data plans just in case you need to use some in an emergency)   You can often do much better than 99c per min with local SIMs (in the UK for example you can get 8c per min to the US, and 12c  per min for calls in the UK from pay as you go SIMs with no contract).  

There are really two issues:

1) Do you need to be contactable on your US number?  If so, the Verizon SIM is good for this,

and some multi-country SIMs will offer an extra-cost option of forwarding calls from your US number.  Local SIMs will not.

2) Convenience.  Are you willing to buy SIMs in multiple countries?  If you are a very short time in each, you may not in fact save money, as you either pay something for the SIM, or it is "free" but with a minimum topup.  So if you need the equivalent of a $10 top up, and you only call for 7 minutes in the country, you would be better off with the Verizon SIM.

Multi-country SIMs get rid of issue 2, and you can buy them before you go.  Examples can be found on http://www.telestial.com/

and http://www.gosim.com/

However, be careful.  The data rates are often more expensive than the Verizon data plan.  Calls can be cheaper, but the SIMs are expensive, so estimate how much you expect to call etc.

It sounds like sticking with VZ might be best.

(I never thought I would recommend that to anyone!   I always use a local SIM because data and calls are so much cheaper, but I tend to stay in one country for a while and return later, reusing the same SIM.)

[silver6055]

if we are planning a lengthy european trip over several countries from Budapest to France next year, how does this work buying sim card in local area?  Would it be one for each country or is a Europe SIM card offered?   We used your SIM and global service 4.99 plan at .99 per minute and used it sparingly, turning off our data while overseas to lower costs, and it worked well when used.