Australia phone

We are a group scheduled for a 12 day tour of Australia (Cairns, Ayers Rock, Alice Springs and Sydney) before our cruise. We would like to have a phone we could use intra-Australia so we can reconfirm and get in touch with various tour companies and hotels along the way.

Can anyone recommend a reliable company that would either rent a phone or sell a prepaid one for this trip? We would prefer to have our phone number before we leave the US so if possible we would want the phone sent to us in advance.

Thank you for your help.

Post Offices,larger supermarkets all sell pre paid "cheap" phones,not sure how you would get one to the US though.

Telstra has the most comprehensive coverage around Australia with their NextG 3G network. Boost mobile runs on their network and you can get an unlimited calls and text within Aus, plus 3GB data for $40 for 30 days prepaid. It run on 850MHZ 3G, so if you have an unlocked handset that covers that you can get a prepaid sim to fit in standard or micro size. When are you arriving here?

When we travel overseas we always take our own phone and buy a local pre-oaid SIM card on arrival in the country. Once activated, we then SMS to family and friends back home, which gives them our phone number. That way we can restrict those who can contact us while we are on holiday.

We will be arriving February 25

Do you have an unlocked 3G handset? Are you wanting data as part of your phone deal? Have you asked the tour people, as they may get asked this a bit, and they could probably confirm whether Telstra is the better coverage or what they know from experience may be different?

I am not sure if you need to start your phone before you go for any reason? Activation of mobile phones here requires ID, usually a drivers license, but I am not sure for overseas visitors. You can ring them from the handset, or activate online, and it is usually ready in a few minutes. They state up to 4 hours but generally my experience is less than 5 minutes. I was trying to work out how to send you a personal message on here but I don't know how.

Getting a prepaid phone in Australia is easy but you will require ID - an international passport is fine.

You might be able to find phones or SIM cards on eBay but you will pay extra if you really want to have the number available before you leave. These May be difficult to get due to the requirements for ID on cell services here. Note also that SIM cards may expire after 6 months if not used so don't get too eager in getting one before your trip.

If you want to use your USA phone you will need to tell us what sort of phone it is, who it is with and check whether it's locked.

As others have said, coverage in order of best to worst is Telstra, Optus/Virgin, Vodafone, however in the places you've mentioned you'll be fine with any of them. The coverage starts to become more important once you leave the cities and towns but I doubt you'd notice much difference between the first two.

You can buy no contract prepaid phones from about $30 upto whatever you want to pay. On top of that you'll probably need around a $30 'recharge' to allow calls and texts. If you plan to text or call people outside Australia it's worth checking if the plan they out you on includes that. It looks like the Telstra one does.

If you have an iPad or similar tablet with cellular any of the above companies have SIM cards for around $30 prepaid that will get you data for a month.

My tip, if you buy one of these from the store ask them to set it up, activate it and make sure it works before you leave the store. Some of them can be lazy and leave it to you to do online or over the phone which is time consuming and silly when you're in their store.

Generally prepaid is very quick to set up, and you need to pop the Sim in the phone and speak to the phone company yourself with your ID, so the shop is unlikely to be lazy in not setting it up. It is just not their responsibility. Generally a store selling prepaid has no access or authority to activate Sim cards.

Go in there with attitude that they are lazy and you will be walking out the door with nothing. They just can't do it, not that they are lazy.

I believe chrisb was referring to buying from the store for that business e.g. Telstra store, vodafone store and so on.

They can readily set up prepaid sim cards in those stores.

I was trying to work out how to send you a personal message on here but I don't know how.

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Thanks Mr W. Seems like the OP has not had time to come back for a while anyhow. It is Christmas after all.

I believe chrisb was referring to buying from the store for that business e.g. Telstra store, vodafone store and so on.

 

They can readily set up prepaid sim cards in those stores.

From my experience the non company owned prepaid phone selling stores out-number the corporate ones, and the big places like Big W and K-mart from my experience would not have access to activate sims, but there you go, maybe I am wrong.

I have also found that a Telstra branded store will direct me to help myself to the phones or computers set up along the side wall to get any prepaid questions answered.

Anyhow, I still believe if I told them not to be lazy and set the thing up they would happily show me where the door is. I have found the part time university students that mainly work in the Telstra and Optus shops I frequent have a wealth of knowledge if you ask them polite questions. They do however feel that the latest $700 phone is the only thing you must have.

I have found the part time university students that mainly work in the Telstra and Optus shops I frequent have a wealth of knowledge if you ask them polite questions. They do however feel that the latest $700 phone is the only thing you must have.

I think that's more a factor of age than them being staff. ;)

Hi 2910car,

Can I suggest you buy a Skype number.

That way you could use your own unlocked mobile phone and also have the number available to give to family before you leave the states. You can select a local number (local to your home) and then anyone that rings you from home only pays for a local phone call.

I usually buy a Skype number and then buy a local prepaid SIM with data in the country I am traveling in. Skype needs data. I use the Skype app on my iPhone 5. Telstra will be best for the SIM as their coverage is superior.

Good luck.

We are sort of in the same situation as the OP. However we have multiple devices (two iphones, two ipads, a kindle and a laptop) I was thinking about buying a prepaid wifi hotspot device that operates over 3G. I know that Virgin Mobile has one for $99. Does anyone have experience with them?

We will be doing an extensive driving tour across Tasmania, Melbourne area, Cairns area, the Gold Coast and Hunter Valley. How is the 3G coverage in those areas? Hoping we can use our ipad/iphone for navigation while driving!

I would probably also sim cards for the iphones as well. I had my carrier unlock both iphones for international travel. By the way if you want to verify that your phone is unlocked before traveling, go to imei.info where you can do a free check.

Here's a link to Telstra's info page for tourists: http://go.telstra.com.au/helpandsupport/-/information-about-telstra-pre-paid-for-tourists-visiting-australia

Painful as they may be if I were a tourist in Oz I would only use Telstra. They give the best coverage even though they offer the worse plans ($). Some of the other service providers use their network so just check Virgin's website to see if they use the Telstra network.

I don't know if you need a hotspot as you can tether your iPad to your iPhone to use its data quota. I don't know that the Virgin Mobile hotspot would be too reliable. I am not a fan of this provider. Do you really need to use the laptop and kindle as well as the iPhones and iPads?

If it were me I would just buy 2 prepaid sims with data for the iPhones and use tethering or even just the internet on my phone. It's only for a couple of weeks.

Navigation through the phone should be fine in most spots you name. I use the google maps and Whereis apps on my iPhone 5 all the time to get around. Melbourne has 4G and reception should be strong. Not sure about Tassie but suspect you will be fine in all but the area near Strahan/Queenstown which is quite remote. Cairns will be fine for reception but if you are planning on traveling further north than the Daintree River you may not have coverage. I think I lost reception around Port Douglass when I was last up there a few years ago. This said the road signage is very clear in the area north of Cairns and you should not need reception for navigation. Reception in the Gold Coast hinterland around O'Reillys and Canungra may be scare. But on the coastal strip and even inland to the main highway (Bruce Hwy) is fine. Not sure about the Hunter but knowing the development in the area and the landscape suspect coverage for navigation will be fine. The biggest issue in the Hunter will be all the little unnamed roads (I am assuming you are going wine tasting). I would call into the local tourist bureau and collect a winery tour map and use this to support my GPS navigation. Check out http://www.winecountry.com.au for maps on the Hunter wine areas too.

In post #16 above, I gave the Telstra link for mobile phone SIMs.

Now that I've poked around their site further, here's a link describing Telstra's current data SIM offer for the iPad and iPad mini. https://www.telstra.com.au/online-shop/tablets.cfm#/bring-your-own It doesn't appear they offer prepaid data SIM for other tablets.

Thanks for the tips. I think I will probably do the two SIM cards for the iPhones. Will check out Telstra since a few people have suggested them. Our iPads are wifi only which is why the wifi hotspot seemed like a good idea. But if Virgin Mobile coverage is poor then not really worth it.

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Thank you all so much for your suggestions. Sorry it took me so long to get back here but we have been traveling.

My husband and I have only very basic cell phones at home and I am sure they would not be usable overseas. We are really technologically challenged.

We will look into the Telstra website. We are arriving in Australia February 26 and sailing on the Solstice March 10 to New Zealand.

We are sort of in the same situation as the OP. However we have multiple devices (two iphones, two ipads, a kindle and a laptop) I was thinking about buying a prepaid wifi hotspot device that operates over 3G. I know that Virgin Mobile has one for $99. Does anyone have experience with them?

 

We will be doing an extensive driving tour across Tasmania, Melbourne area, Cairns area, the Gold Coast and Hunter Valley. How is the 3G coverage in those areas? Hoping we can use our ipad/iphone for navigation while driving!

 

I would probably also sim cards for the iphones as well. I had my carrier unlock both iphones for international travel. By the way if you want to verify that your phone is unlocked before traveling, go to imei.info where you can do a free check.

Hi there,

Having spent 12 weeks in Cairns this years, TELSTRA (unfortunately) is the only carrier to use. My DH uses Vodafone and had little or know signal most of the time. We also travelled thru the Torrres Strait and Telstra for coverage in outlying country areas is the only way to go. If you get a pre-paid try the Telstra Simplicity package, it does have low rates! Optus has improved, but definitely don't get a Vodafone sim. Hope this helps.