PIPsters & previous PG'ers - Has anyone had experience renting a cell phone to use in FP while on the PG? We want to do so to keep in touch with our housesitter and monitor the welfare of our dear little doggies and kitty. We used a rented phone on the Norwegian fjords cruise last summer and were much more comfortable talking with our housesitter in person than communicating via email as we did the summer before. Unfortunately, the company we used last summer does not handle FP. Any ideas will be gratefully welcomed by these two over-protective doggie (and kitty) dads. Cheers, Fred & Pat

I had a cell phone and it worked beautifully. T-mobile works. Get a GSM phone.
Overview
T-Mobile is uniquely positioned to offer you and your business a direct connection to the latest GSM technology, the worldwide digital wireless standard. GSM allows users to cross international boundaries and still make and receive calls with a single handset and phone number.



T-Mobile, the premier United States GSM carrier, has a substantial number of roaming agreements throughout the world. With an international GSM handset and T-Mobile service, you can easily keep in touch with your home or office while travelling abroad.

Benefits of using T-Mobile Rentals GSM Service:
Just one phone and one phone number
VoiceMail
Save on hotel and credit card calls
Outstanding call clarity & security
You're easily reached around the world
Complete accessory pack
Free convenient return
24-hour customer support

Excellent questions, my dearest Fred! Just the right questions to ask!

Thanks, Andi.
We need another cell phone like a hole in our head.
The Car requires an ATT/Cingular phone
We are on a two year Verizon Contract which gets us the best reception in our area
and now we need TMobile to travel!

Hi Fred,

I second Andi's answer. I have a T-Mobile GSM phone (actually it's the Blackberry version so I have e-mail everywhere too) and it seems to work everywhere except Japan. This year alone I've had occasion to use it from a number of European countries, Brazil, Venezuela, Singapore, India, China and Thailand. Coverage is getting better in the US too. I finally can use it inside my house now.

Say hi to Pat and have a fabulous time on PIP

m'ellen

To add to my bride's answer:

While she was in Switzerland, I had T-Mobile. I had better service over there than I did at home.
I can comment on M'ellen's remark: I get VERY poor service in my home.

BUT over there... including FP, it worked wonderfully. I had 4 bars in St Petersburg!

But, do understand that when you are out at sea, service will be weak.

Enjoy the PG! (I know that you will).
Franco is the best!

Doug

Before you buy anymore phones, check the one you have. I have Cingular service, and the Motorola phone that I carry is a GSM phone. I know that we got service off the coast of Acapulco, and I'll be checking to see what kind of coverage they have in Europe/Africa before ROAR.

Freddie...if you have a GSM (tri band)phone you can buy a SIM card called Vini card in Tahiti. It is a prepaid card that give you a local phone number and a certain amount of communication time. I found them in the Poste Office. The service is not cheap, but will offer you the opportunity to communicate with home using your own phone anywhere a cell signal is available. You can be reached from home by giving them your Vini number.

Nextel does not work. I have a GSM Nextel that I used in Europe(worked better that in the US). It doesn't work in Tahiti, It will be good for me right now. I'm getting tired of people calling me right now anyway.

You can rent a phone from T-mobile. Check their website.

Margo is right. Any GSM phone will work...I have ATT/Cingular now and it also works abroad. I believe Verizon will NOT work.

Verizon will not work, correct. Verizon uses CDMA, not GSM.

Masaki

I am checking with AT&T/singular.
Verizon does not work in FP
T Moblle has a plan - $2.49 a minute for calls home. You can rent the phone for $3.99 a day or you can also do a pre-paid plan with them, get a free phone, rent the Sim card and the rate is a little less.

What ever it costs, will still be less than my 10 minute call home from our Bermuda Cruise ship to shore. That whopper was $75.00.

I wonder if you could rent a cellphone right at the airport coming in? Anybody tried that? I know there's a cellphone store right in the terminal, or at least there was.

I've had a Siemens GSM tri band phone for about 3 years with AT&T (now Cingular). The only place I haven't been able to use it was in Viet Nam as AT&T did not have a roaming agreement with the local carrier.

I think you can check your carrier's website to see which countries they do have agreements with.

AT&T/Cingular will not put the international chip in a telephone and open service to people not on their system for 180 days regardless of credit or residency.

That blew me away!

Todd had something put in his phone when we went on the Chilean fjords cruise. Maybe you could e-mail him in case he is not checking into the board so often. Or better yet, ask him on sunday!

Kathy....thanks for the info on Cingular. I just switched from T-Mobile to Cingular because I couldn't even get a T-Mobile single in my new home. I won't be traveling until November so perhaps I'll be able to get international roaming then. I checked Cingular's site, they do offer roaming in French Polynesia. The charges are $1.99 per minute.

Here's a link to Cingular's International Service Information.

I had a post card from American Express Platinum hanging on my "bulletin board" (actually the end of a cabinet), advertising rental phones from WorldRoam. The site on the card is

www.worldroam.co.uk/platinum

I never checked it out, just taped it to the "bb".

I have the new Motorola Razor with Cingular which is a quad band and can work everywhere. It is $100 with a 2 year contract.

Thanks for all the good info. I am now likely to buy a GSM phone and then just buy the SIM cards for the places we will be visiting. That way, I can buy SIM cards for French Polynesia for PIP, buy new cards for the Western Caribbean on Silver Whisper in November, and, of course, a card for South Africa next April on ROAR. The T-Mobile per minute fees with a rental phone were very high ($4.50 or so per minute!!), compared to the Vini (French Polynesia cell phone company) rate of less than half that. Pam, I will definitely look into the WorldRoam options. They look pretty good, although I am not an AmEx cardholder (we keep all of our miles on United Visa). If WorldRoam will deal with us plebians who do not use AmEx Platinum, that may be a good source of both phone and SIM cards. Lordie, this is far too complicated for my simple brain to handle - GSM, SDMA, etc. What happened to the good old days when one would just go on holiday and not contact home for several weeks? Now, we cannot even imagine being out of touch with our housesitter every day. After all, if one of the dogs or the kitty is feeling a bit punk, we have to give suggestions to our housesitter for remedies (ginger biscuits, fresh tuna, valium - for the housesitter). Cheers, Fred

Freddie, my son is a paramedic/paramedic instructor, and he tends to be gone from home for several days at a time. One of their cockatiels will start pulling her feathers out if he's gone too long, so he has to talk to her on the phone to get her to stop.

Don't forget, Freddie - most new phones that you buy (from T-Mobile and Cingular for that matter) will be "locked" to the carrier for X amount of days after you buy it. This means, that you can't just purchase another SIM card (from Vini for instance) and use it in the phone until you get past the lock out period. This is because the phones are subsidized by the carrier - they don't want you to purchase the phone and then run away to another carrier to use it on their service. It's possible to buy "unlocked" phones to get around this problem but they will cost more.

Masaki

Masaki - Thanks for reinforcing the info I had found on a couple of sites which do indeed point out that their phones are "unlocked". Then, I will just have to buy the right SIM card for FP and should be able to use the phone on other cruises by buying new SIM cards for those countries. It is a bit peculiar but beats having to subscribe to T-Mobile for some long period of time (not to mention pay T-Mobile's high rates). Now I just have to review those sites and choose a phone which will get to me before we leave on PIP in THREE WEEKS. (Docs arriving here on Thursday!!). Cheers, Fred

So envious of PIP coming up in 3 wks. Best of luck with the phone search!

Masaki

I'm a cingular customer and although their overseas per minute rates have come down over the years, they still charge for both outgoing and incoming calls. If you buy an unlocked quad or tri-band gsm phone, you can purchase pre-paid sim cards for wherever your travels take you. And, in most countries, you pay only for outgoing calls, not incoming calls. I call my office, family, etc then have them call me back. It's usually much, much cheaper. Please check before purchasing international sim cards that incoming are free. There are a few countries that practice the highway robbery tactics of USA carriers and charge for both incoming and outgoing calls. For unlocked tri and quad band gsm phones and prepaid sim cards I've used both ustronics.com and telestial.com. Sometimes one is having a better deal in what I need.
For those who already own "locked" gsm phones go to travelinsider.com (a good travel info resource). There is info on how to unlock your current gsm phone. Costs about $5.00 I think.

Greenflash has provided an excellent site for anyone looking at using a cell phone internationally. They have done a great series of articles on the subject.

http://www.thetravelinsider.info/2002/0308.htm

Greenflash...thank you! Finally a very well written explaination of SIM Cards, Multi-Band phones etc.

Freddie--this topic interests me, b/c I'll be in F/P in November, and I will also be leaving my precious dog with a housesitter. I don't understand much of the technical talk, but I did just get onto cingular and they assured me that there was international roaming. I don't even CARE what the cost is, I just want to be able to be in touch with the gal who's caring for my beloved dog. I'm having a REALLY hard time being GONE that long (nearly 1 month).

I just got a T Mobile phone that will do FP for $2.99 a min. as well as let me use AOL Instant Messenger for a very small charge.

It is not unlocked now, but, the only place I will ever need to pay that amount per min is FP. For the other travel I will be doing, the rate will be $.99 a min. I think it's cheaper than renting plus the minute cost is higher. Cingular and ATT will not give you international use until you have been with them at least 90 days.