Phone Service

We recently returned from a driving trip/cruise to New Zealand and Australia and wanted to report on using a US phone there. We use a Verizon Iphone and bought two Vodafone SIM cards. One in NZ for NZ$29 bought at the airport and a second in AUS (for a few days use) for A$10 bought at a tourist info site. This worked well for us and was not expensive. They worked for both voice for in country and US calls and data.

Given the cruise was very port intensive we never had to buy on board internet and we didn't have to try to find WiFi while ashore. We did use hotel Wifi for most data. When you buy them you need your passport. Happy cruising.

So did the cost of the SIM card include any international minutes or data, or was it just for minutes in side the country? How much did international calls cost?

We considered that option (which is the most cost efficient) but opted to go with Verizon's international plan. Why? We wanted to keep our US number in case there was an emergency back home and someone needed to call us.

As mentioned, Verizon's plan is more expensive than buying a SIM card, but not much more so. The thing to note is that when you use the phone to call a local NZ or AUS number, it's like dialing from the US...you have to include the country code and area code, but not the leading zero of the area code.

Unless of course you're dialing a 1-300 number in AUS in which case you just dial it without any codes. Confusing ? Yes, but with the help of some locals we figured it out.

So did the cost of the SIM card include any international minutes or data, or was it just for minutes in side the country? How much did international calls cost?

The plan in NZ did include international calls to many countries including the US. It did come with 500MB of data and 200 minutes of calling to all included countries for up to thirty days. This worked well for us. There were higher options available as well. In Australia they had a similar cards but we just got a pay as you go A$10 card that was per minute/per MB since we were there only for three days and had WiFi at the hotel.

One thing to note is that we did have to get a new SIM for each country since even though both are Vodafone they are different companies. Also, I assume other vendors have similar plans but we didn't check them out.

We considered that option (which is the most cost efficient) but opted to go with Verizon's international plan. Why? We wanted to keep our US number in case there was an emergency back home and someone needed to call us.

As mentioned, Verizon's plan is more expensive than buying a SIM card, but not much more so. The thing to note is that when you use the phone to call a local NZ or AUS number, it's like dialing from the US...you have to include the country code and area code, but not the leading zero of the area code.

Unless of course you're dialing a 1-300 number in AUS in which case you just dial it without any codes. Confusing ? Yes, but with the help of some locals we figured it out.

This is the first time we tried the new SIM Card route and it worked well for us. The longer the trip the better to make it worth it.

It is an advantage for sure to keep the same number. You are right that it is

a convenience vs cost decision. We just txted the new number to our family and neighbor watching our house first thing in the unlikely event of an emergency. What I didn't like about the VZ plan was that it didn't have flexible start dates so you had to be billed by the month for it and you must remember to stop it when you got back ASAP. From my calculation, it would have been about 2.5 times the cost for us.

I have a question regarding this post. I have an I phone and I don't believe it has a sim card. does it? Also I would just want to be able to text my family so how would I go about doing that?

I have a question regarding this post. I have an I phone and I don't believe it has a sim card. does it? Also I would just want to be able to text my family so how would I go about doing that?

As far as I know all phones have a sim card - even my 10 year old flip phone.

If you just want to text, use only the wifi features of your device (internet) and find a free wifi hot spot like your hotel.

I have a question regarding this post. I have an I phone and I don't believe it has a sim card. does it? Also I would just want to be able to text my family so how would I go about doing that?

Certainly has a SIM card, there is a little hole on the side of the phone, if you look closely it's in a cut out, inside that is your SIM, might be better to take it in when you buy a SIm they'll put it in for you.

Your phone most probably has a SIM card. Some older Verizon phones did not have a SIM card but that is a thing of the past. All iphones support both CDMA (Verizon used technology) and GSM (world standard that uses SIM cards).

As stated the sales person will put it in for you if you get one at a phone service store. Be sure to not lose your original so it can be put back!

HAHA ok so I figured out how to remove my Iphone 5S from it's case, and there is a little hole on the side so I guess that's where the sim card is. I will definitely go to the phone store and have them put the sim card in I need. Thanks everyone :)