Mobile Roaming: Cheapest Calls When You're Abroad

doggielover

Hi, I will be going on a Caribbean cruise and then staying in Barbados for a week. I am currently with EE but would like to know if there would be a cheaper option for me to call home and for people to call me. I will probably have to use an iPhone 4s as believe my current phone is locked to EE. Thanks

grumbler

visidigi wrote: »

O2 in the EU (which includes Italy) is £1.99 a day for data. Calls are 50p then taking from your usual bundle.

Also, Italy is a part of Three's 'Feel At Home' area:

• Australia
• Austria
• Denmark
• Finland
• France
• Hong Kong
• Indonesia
• Israel
• Italy
• Macau
• Norway
• Republic of Ireland
• Sri Lanka
• Sweden
• Switzerland
• United States

grumbler

doggielover wrote: »

Hi, I will be going on a Caribbean cruise and then staying in Barbados for a week. I am currently with EE but would like to know if there would be a cheaper option for me to call home and for people to call me.

Don't know about Barbados, but AFAIK cruises are often (normally?) not covered even by expensive roaming bundles.

redux

doggielover wrote: »

Hi, I will be going on a Caribbean cruise and then staying in Barbados for a week. I am currently with EE but would like to know if there would be a cheaper option for me to call home and for people to call me. I will probably have to use an iPhone 4s as believe my current phone is locked to EE. Thanks

The main Caribbean networks are Digicel and Lime.

They are arranged as separate networks per territory, but I believe they each have free roaming around their partners.

So it might be worth looking at a SIM from one or the other. You'd probably have coverage on the upper decks of the ship at up to 30 km from each island, depending on the transmitter height, like I can get UK networks just outside Calais.

And look into cheap calls providers for friends and family to reach you. For your calls, the SIM may have reasonable international rates (I haven't checked) or look into callthrough or callback arrangements, or with a good data connection use VoIP.

Out of range of land based networks, most cruise ships nowadays have mobile coverage connected usually by satellite, so roaming on those isn't cheap. The EE site may have tariff info somewhere, but it's unlikely to be under £1.50 a minute, maybe £2 or £3 or more.

doggielover

Thanks for your help. Would I be able to purchase one of these sim cards before I go or is it best to purchase when I get there?

s71hj

Roger1 wrote: »

SWISS Mobile could be useful for some, not always the cheapest but cheap in many countries.

https://www.swiss.com/ch/en/book/swiss-choice/swiss-mobile?WT.mc_id=SMM_Facebook_WW_SIMcard_141014#t-page=pane2

I've been looking for a solution for when travelling to South Africa, other than buying a new SIM every time with the problems of registering the SIM and losing unused credit. The usual suspects are hugely expensive. For example, the SWISS Mobile SIM offers:

so free receiving and very cheap data and SMSs.

CHF 0.14 = approx 9p, CHF 0.10 = approx 7p.

That data rate alone would make this useful in many countries, even if it means carrying two phones, one to call, the other for data.

Starter SIM costs CHF 29.90 including CHF 20 credit. It comes with a +44 Jersey number.

It's an offer from SWISS (the airline) and is an MVNO powered by http://nakamobile.com/

Tried to calculate rates Morocco to UKand it just came back with "rates consulted". No other explanation. Anyone know what this means?

Roger1

I see:

Rates Consulted

Call-Back rate
Calling to a landline in United Kingdom
CHF 0.36 / min.
Calling to a mobile number in United Kingdom
CHF 0.36 / min.
Local calls in Morocco
CHF 0.36 / min.
Incoming calls in Morocco
CHF 0.24 / min.
Sending SMS in Morocco
CHF 1.59 / SMS
Using data in Morocco
CHF 24.60 / MB

I haven't checked other operators' rates and don't know if this is competitive. Note that they charge for receiving calls in Morocco.

s71hj

Roger1 wrote: »

I see:


I haven't checked other operators' rates and don't know if this is competitive. Note that they charge for receiving calls in Morocco.

Thanks. May be because I'm on a tablet not a pc. At the risk of sounding reallystupid what does CHF mean!!!

MikeWhite

s71hj wrote: »

At the risk of sounding reallystupid what does CHF mean!!!

Swiss Francs

Roger1

CHF = Swiss Francs. 1 Swiss Franc = approx £0.67.

EDIT: I see MikeWhite was quicker.