Using my BB while traveling abroad

[edchauss]

If this was already posted I apologize but I did a couple of searches and didn't see what I wanted. I'm going to be traveling to Australia and New Zealand next year on vacation and I'm curious about being able to use my phone over there. I only want to be able to use it occassionally for like calling to set up an excursion or make a dinner reservation or get directions to some place, etc. I asked about this when I got the phone and the rep said I just need to call and activate the ability to do this ahead of time. She also said I could just get a per use rate for how much I use it instead of having to get a plan. Does anyone have experience with this and what tips or advice do you have for me? I'm curious about costs and coverage and if it's seemless or I need to do something to activate it. Thanks in advance.

[oakie]

just get it unlocked and use a local prepaid sim card.

[SimeonAS89]

Yeah local sim card is going to be much cheaper then using the T-Mo plan.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[edchauss]

Originally Posted by oakie

just get it unlocked and use a local prepaid sim card.

If I get it unlocked will that affect my service with tmo at all when I do come back home to the states? Or will I have to get it set back to tmo? And getting a prepaid sim would I just go into any local carrier and have them set it up? Does anyone know of any carriers that would work in both Australia and New Zealand or would I have to do this in both countries to avoid international calling fees?

[Dawg357]

I have done both when out of the country - - the above posters are very correct in saying that you will find it much cheaper if you get the sim unlock code from tmobile (they will give it to you after 90 days service) and when you travel just go into a local cell phone provider's shop and purchase their pre-paid sim card.......I think in most cases you will find that calls back to the US will be less than a dollar per minute that way.

If you use the tmobile sim card you will be looking at charges more in the neighborhood of $1.49 or so depending on which country.......tmobile does have an excelent area on their web site concerning intl roaming and the charges you will incure in different countries if you use the intl roaming through them. Also if you go to "my tmobile" you can activate your intl roaming authorization right there from their my tmobile web site - - depending on your credit check (if it was good credit) - you can add that feature almost imediately - it simply will allow your account to be active for intl roaming and there is no charge for the activation and you only have to do it once - in other words it will stay active unless you cancel it for some reason. A word of caution that always seems to bite people that use the intl roaming feature - - if your phone is on when you are out of country and a call comes in and you dont answer it and it goes to your voicemail - you will be charged for the call even if you dont retrieve the voicemail. To stop this from happening there are a couple solutions - 1. turn off your phone so no unanswered calls can get sent to voicemail - only turn on your phone to use it for your calls, otherwise leave it turned off - or - 2. go into your phone settings >call forwarding - and set "Forward All Calls" to the voicemail number (+18056377243 - wich is +1 805 message) - that way any incoming calls to your number go right to voicemail without trying to locate your phone on the foreign carrier's network, and that way you wont rack up any intl charges for incoming calls that bounce from your roaming handset back to voicemail, but obviously you wont recieve those incoming calls on your phone while you are roaming internationally either.

I set the forwarding to voicemail this way, and then buy a pre-paid sim from the foriegn provider and then just call that (+1 805 message) number to retrieve the voicemail - it's a lot cheaper that way - like the guys said up above.

Be sure at any rate to go to the tmobile web page and read the faq's for intl roaming - loads of good information on their web page and you can look up intl roaming rates for the country you are going to - also good instructions on their web page concerning use of "+" and making calls - also note that the customer care number when roaming is different (+1 505-998-3793) - always good to have that number with you just in case. If you need any more information or help with this feel free to email me here at CB. Hope that wasn't too confusing

[Dawg357]

Originally Posted by edchauss

If I get it unlocked will that affect my service with tmo at all when I do come back home to the states? Or will I have to get it set back to tmo? And getting a prepaid sim would I just go into any local carrier and have them set it up? Does anyone know of any carriers that would work in both Australia and New Zealand or would I have to do this in both countries to avoid international calling fees?

The sim unlock or subsidy lock is just meant to prevent people from buying a subsidised or discounted phone from a carrier and then running away to another carrier to set up service with the phone - they dont want to sell you a phone at a discount just to have you use it elsewhere. After 90 days of service you can simply call T-Mo and ask for the unlock code and you can tell them it is to use a prepaid sim card while traveling - they have no problem with this scenario - - I usually just email them and they reply with the unlock code - they supply step by step instructions to enter the unlock code. It wont effect anything on the phone with your service - it just allows the phone to accept a sim card from another carrier - that's all it does - once the phone is unlocked you can use any carrier's sim card and it will always be unlocked for the future. This also increases the value of your phone if you sell it on eBay or to someone else because it is now an "unlocked GSM phone"

You might check out GSM World - the website of the GSM Association to see what carriers are in Aus and New Zealand - you might find one that covers both countries, but I suspect it would be a different carrier in each location.

[Dawg357]

You might also want to turn off the BlackBerry data so you dont get charged for emails sent to your phone while roaming if you keep the tmobile sim card in the phone on your trip. Or you can add the $19.99 intl email feature for your trip and then when you get back simply drop that feature add on. I see many people on this board that do that for their B-Berry email feature when roaming overseas - because it is just an add-on feature you can add it or take it off your account anytime - its not part of your plan contract.

[Dawg357]

If you want to be a "Power Roamer" go out and pick up an inexpensive unlocked GSM quad band phone - like a simple Nokia or something cheap - put the foreign sim card in that phone and keep the tmo sim card in your B-Berry so now you are really ready for your trip!!!! I must have about ten unlocked phones sitting around my house in various drawers - - when I travel abroad I always have two phones set up like that

[Dawg357]

Oh - one last post on this subject and then I quit

I notice you have the 8320 - - you can always turn off your mobile network connection in the connection manager and then activate the WiFi and use the UMA feature if you find an open Wifi network to make calls back to US over the Wifi network to avoid roaming charges that way too. Now I am not 100% sure on this one detail - but I do know if you are using the UMA feature to call back to States you will only be using your regular minutes from your plan, but someone on here said that if you use it to make local calls i.e. in Aus to an Aus number you might get additional charges that way, but I am not certain about that - - I do know that no additional charges if you just use UMA to call back State side - just uses your regular minutes from your plan. Anyone have any experience with the local calls on UMA when out of country that wants to chime in with answer here?????

[Dawg357]

T-Mobile Intl FAQs page:

Intl Roaming FAQs

[AtlSully]

Originally Posted by edchauss

If this was already posted I apologize but I did a couple of searches and didn't see what I wanted. I'm going to be traveling to Australia and New Zealand next year on vacation and I'm curious about being able to use my phone over there. I only want to be able to use it occassionally for like calling to set up an excursion or make a dinner reservation or get directions to some place, etc. I asked about this when I got the phone and the rep said I just need to call and activate the ability to do this ahead of time. She also said I could just get a per use rate for how much I use it instead of having to get a plan. Does anyone have experience with this and what tips or advice do you have for me? I'm curious about costs and coverage and if it's seemless or I need to do something to activate it. Thanks in advance.

Hey.....there is a bunch of good info for you here....if you want any more detailed stuff PIN me (24769212)...i can answer all the uma/ australian carrier/NZ/unlocking questions you may have as im australian (and live in Atl too) and have uma on my 8120 and understand it all pretty well too which helps...
Dave

[Dawg357]

Originally Posted by AtlSully

Hey.....there is a bunch of good info for you here....if you want any more detailed stuff PIN me (24769212)...i can answer all the uma/ australian carrier/NZ/unlocking questions you may have as im australian (and live in Atl too) and have uma on my 8120 and understand it all pretty well too which helps...
Dave

Sully: since you are more familiar with the intl UMA usage - can you answer the question as to intl charges - - I understand that if you use UMA from abroad for a call back to USA that it will just use normal minutes from plan just as if you were here in the States - - but somewhere on an earlier post someone said that if you were abroad and made a local call (within that foreign country) over UMA that you would incure a roaming charge from T-Mobile - - can you verify or debunk that info??????

[edchauss]

Originally Posted by Dawg357

T-Mobile Intl FAQs page:

Intl Roaming FAQs

Dawg, outstanding info! Thanks!!! I've been with tmo for 10 years so will I still have to wait 90 days into this contract for them to unlock my phone? If not I'm going to do that this weekend.

Now, what's the deal with being a power roamer and having two phones? I really only want the ability to make a dinner reservation or call some place to reserve a place for an excursion (say bungee jumping off a bridge) and get directions while in country. That kind of thing. But I suppose it would be nice to have access to the world back home too in case something happened to my parents, etc. Is that just so I'll have a phone with access to calling from any place I might be?

Also, when I use a prepaid sim card from a local carrier will I still have my same USA number? Or will they give me a local one?

[AtlSully]

Originally Posted by Dawg357

Sully: since you are more familiar with the intl UMA usage - can you answer the question as to intl charges - - I understand that if you use UMA from abroad for a call back to USA that it will just use normal minutes from plan just as if you were here in the States - - but somewhere on an earlier post someone said that if you were abroad and made a local call (within that foreign country) over UMA that you would incure a roaming charge from T-Mobile - - can you verify or debunk that info??????

that is all correct, if you call to usa from overseas and have uma you will only be charged minutes from your plan. If you subscribe to tmo's hot spot at home plan you will not be charged any minutes, its included in your $9.99 monthly charge. if you are overseas and call locally on uma you will be charged, similarly as you are when your in the usa and call overseas. i dont know thats its neccesarily a roaming charge, just an international call charge.
hope this helps

[AtlSully]

Originally Posted by edchauss

Dawg, outstanding info! Thanks!!! I've been with tmo for 10 years so will I still have to wait 90 days into this contract for them to unlock my phone? If not I'm going to do that this weekend.

Now, what's the deal with being a power roamer and having two phones? I really only want the ability to make a dinner reservation or call some place to reserve a place for an excursion (say bungee jumping off a bridge) and get directions while in country. That kind of thing. But I suppose it would be nice to have access to the world back home too in case something happened to my parents, etc. Is that just so I'll have a phone with access to calling from any place I might be?

Also, when I use a prepaid sim card from a local carrier will I still have my same USA number? Or will they give me a local one?

tmobile will unlock your phone, only if you bought it thru them and have had it for 3 months. if you bought it off ebay or something like that i dont think they will do it...but there are other companies that will do it for a fee.

if you purchase prepaid sim in Oz, you will receive a local number, your phone must be unlocked for this to work. the advantage of this is that you will have cheap local calls and you can still calll the US (via uma) for free.