<p>I tried searching CC for updated information on this topic with few results. D is leaving in 3 weeks for London fall semester, but starting with a 10 day trip to Ireland with the program. I have a few questions: 1) Is it important for D to have internet access for emails when abroad? 2) Suggestions for getting a SIM Card before she goes through the mail? 3) Will the same SIM card work in both Ireland and England?
She has an IPhone but everything I've read on CC suggests that she should keep this at home. Thanks for any help.</p>
<p>One of our kids did a study abroad in London. He purchased an Orange mobile phone and minutes THERE. He did not take his IPhone with him at all. He did take his computer and did have email access which he needed for his university communications during the study abroad and to communicate with others. His housing in London had internet.</p>
<p>DD is living abroad now too…and also purchased her cell phone in the country where she is living along with the minutes to use…hers happens to be a “smart phone” Nokia of some sort and she does have internet access with it and the minutes she purchases.</p>
<p>Everything we read in both instances suggested NOT taking a U.S. phone but rather getting a mobile phone IN the country.</p>
<p>Perhaps your daughter could contact whomever is sponsoring her study abroad. They would likely have suggestions for what to do…and with whom.</p>
<p>I would also suggest that both and your daughter download Skype for long distance communication to home. Computer to computer it’s free. I haven’t looked yet, but I believe Google has a similar service.</p>
<p>As the poster above said get your daughter to get a phone when she is in Ireland/UK. Be aware though that some times the reception in Dublin is poor, my DD last year could only make and receive calls when she was away from the city.</p>
<p>[Three</a> - Pay As You Go - Pay As You Go On Three](<a href=“Pay as you go | Three”>Pay as you go | Three)</p>
<p>D1 is getting trained in UK for 2 months. For 15pound, she gets 3000 minutes, 3000 tests and unlimited data, and international call is only .03/min. She brought her unlocked phone with her, but then decided to put the sim card into her iPhone because it has unlimited data. She calls me almost everyday for very little cost. She also has an application on her iPhone which allows her to text her friends in the US for free (I think it´s called Kick?). Of course, with her iPhone, she is also receiving her emails in real time. Her colleagues have other plans, and they are all more expensive.</p>
<p>oldfort- what does ‘unlocked’ phone mean? And, to clarify, she bought a sim card in the UK and installed it in her iPhone from home?</p>
<p>All phones in the US are locked phones, they can only be used with a particular carrier. It is very easy to get your phone unlocked - call up your carrier (ATT or Verizon) and they would give you a code and procedure to unlock your phone. The exception is iPhone, you need to have a professional to put a sim card into an iPhone, which is what D1 did when she arrived in UK (after she bought her sim card). I think it was $40. Yes, she used her iPhone from home. She was afraid to do it (if anything should go wrong, it would be out of warranty), but they were pros. When she comes back to the US, she will then put her ATT sim card back into the iPhone.</p>
<p>Got it, thanks! I couldn’t find an app by the name Kick. If you could verify it would be greatly appreciated. My son is not going to London until Spring semester, so I’ve got some time to figure all these things out.</p>
<ul>
<li><p>She could buy a phone once she gets there and load it with minutes as needed.</p></li>
<li><p>She could just take her iPhone and use it there as-is but turn off the network access of the phone and speak on it only sparingly. When she finds herself within range of a free wireless access area she can turn the network access back on and use her iPhone for her emails or she could wait until she’s at a computer somewhere to check her emails. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>To do the above she’d need to not use her phone the way she’s may now (i.e. texting every other minute trivial messages, frequent and long phone calls, for checking email every 10 seconds) which is a good thing anyway IMO.</p>
<p>When my D did a study abroad in the UK she just used the second method of being careful not to use the phone too much, she just used it for checking in every now and then, which worked out fine. </p>
<p>FSUDAD1 - Most phones are ‘locked’ to work only on the network through which one bought the phone - i.e. AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, etc. - even though the phone itself can work on other networks it remains tied to that particular carrier unless it’s ‘unlocked’ which is done via a procedure that can be done by the carrier or sometimes others. Once the phone is unlocked it’ll work on any network that’s compatible with one of its operating frequencies and encoding type which allows one to get a SIM card from the other network and use it ‘natively’. Example - if the phone is locked to AT&T then it can still be used with other networks in Europe (the Orange network, etc.) but it’ll still get charged through AT&T at AT&T’s international rates for the area. If the same phone is ‘unlocked’ then one can replace the SIM card with one purchased in Europe (or sometimes it can be pre-purchased here) and that SIM card could be pre-loaded with minutes and then one is paying the ‘local rates’ and nothing related to AT&T - it essentially is no longer an AT&T phone until the former SIM card is put back in (so make sure to keep it and not throw it away).</p>
<p>Whoops - crossed with ‘oldfort’.</p>
<p>D is in England now. Has her US cell phone with her but in airplane mode so she won’t get hit with any incoming text or call charges; wanted to have it so she can communicate once back in the US. </p>
<p>Friends of ours who were working in the U.K. gave her a British cell phone with 20 pounds of time left on it; she only used it to call us once she landed. She’s been communicating with U.S. peeps via facebook chat and skype. We downloaded apps for textie and viper but haven’t used them. For some reason she’s fine with an internet connection on campus with her laptop, but hasn’t been able to connect with her iPod touch. And if she’s on her laptop it’s just as easy to use FB chat or skype.</p>
<p>Thanks for all of the suggestions they were great. The three network website was a good resource. Any suggestions about unlocked phones to buy before she goes to use these sim cards with data? I’m not sure I’m ready to tamper with the American I-Phone - it’s pretty new.</p>
<p>My son has an iPhone and he took it to Europe but left it on airplane mode unless he was in a place with wifi, like an internet cafe. This is important, otherwise the iPhone will receive data even when it is turned off which will incur charges you do not want. He did not take a laptop, so the iPhone was his email/internet device while abroad.</p>
<p>He purchased an unlocked, quad-band phone from ebay before he left for the purpose of making phone calls while he was in Europe. He did NOT use his iPhone for making phone calls while he was there, because he only used his iPhone in wifi places for internet and email.</p>
<p>My son bought a sim card off the internet specifically for the country he was going to. You can google and find places to buy the sim card with minutes on it. The reason he did this was he wanted an operational phone to have on the flight over there. He did not want to wait until after he was overseas to have a phone. He did not know how long he would be there before he could manage to get out and find a phone, so he wanted to have one already, with the sim card and minutes, ready to go. Remember the charger and adapter (if necessary).</p>
<p>There may be other ways to do it, but this worked well for my son.</p>
<p>[BlackBerry</a> to iPhone Instant Messaging | Kik Chat](<a href=“http://firstsearchblue.com/iphone-bbm-kik-chat/]BlackBerry”>BlackBerry to iPhone Instant Messaging | Kik Chat – FirstSearch Blue)
It´s KIK. Many places (countries) do not have unlimited texting, so a lot of kids outside of US have BB in order to use BB messaging. Of course now, there are softwares to allow people to use data service for IM. </p>
<p>When D2 (in the US) told me that she and D2 have been texting each other, I freaked out because it´s .25/message international, but they told me that they were using this software on their iPhones to text each other (Mom, you are so out of date).</p>
<p>@ Twoparent</p>
<p>Careful - if it is a Verizon iPhone, it will not work in Europe AT ALL, since Verizon phones use the CDMA standard, which is not supported by ANY European networks. There is no such thing as a SIM card on a CDMA phone - they are basically useless outside of North America!</p>
<p>Now, if it is an AT&T iPhone - those are GSM, like European phones are, and can be unlocked to replace the SIM card. I don’t know the specifics about unlocking it, but it is theoretically possible, unlike on a CDMA phone.</p>
<p>What I do is I have a cheap Nokia GSM phone that I purchased unlocked. I use it on trips to Europe and the Caribbean - I buy the SIM card at the destination with prepaid minutes. (I do some research beforehand on which company has the best rates.) No hassle at all!</p>
<p>Skype is even more convenient and hassle-free.</p>
<p>I didn´t know that about Verizon iPhone. Both D1& D2 have ATT iPhone.</p>
<p>Twoparent: Pm me when you have time; the program has info re: phones/internet access…not sure if you got it yet…</p>