<p>Does anyone have information on best (both quality and price) phone services for students who are abroad for a year. My daughter will be in Europe for the next 2 semesters and I'm wondering if we should use a domestic provider, European provider, or even an Internet-based service.</p>
<p>If anyone has seen a good comparison of different services it would be great to review. Thank you.</p>
<p>Phone cards.</p>
<p>Pay by phone cards. Getting a new phone and setting up a new cell account will end up being a big pain.</p>
<p>If your daughter NEEDS a cell phone she can get one over there, pay as you go, from Viring Mobile, for example, and use phone cards with that.</p>
<p>Taking a US provider over will end up being ASTRONOMICALLY expensive and odds are that your service will be shoddy.</p>
<p>Both of my kids just went through traveling in Europe with cell phones. My D ended up taking her US phone which by the way had amazingly clear reception (much better than here and without any dropped calls), but we just received our cell phone bill, and yes, it was fairly expensive. She was supposed to change her sim card when she arrived in Europe, but she thought for some reason that she didn't need to - she probably didn't realize how much we would be talking. On the other hand, my S was given a phone with an international number, and then he bought a phone card to use with it. If she goes abroad again, which is probably going to be sooner than later, then she'll either have to buy or rent a phone overseas and buy a phone card or take her own phone but this time change the sim card. Another option would be to talk through the computer using SKYPE, which seems to be fairly popular.</p>
<p>Here is a thread regarding changing a sim card for travel in Europe that I started in July. Perhaps this will be helpful. Evidently, I need to re-read it myself. <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=359562&highlight=changing+sim+card%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=359562&highlight=changing+sim+card</a></p>
<p>Calling a European mobile phone from the US will cost you a fortune. Phone cards are a huge ripoff too, and too much hassle IMO. </p>
<p>I've lived abroad for 3 years and personally used Skype the whole time. It hasn't really caught on in the US yet, but nearly all young people in Europe (and older ones who keep up with technology) use it. All calls anywhere in Western Europe, US and Canada are 2 cents a minute; that's anytime, any day of the week. No connection fees, membership fees, no contracts, no bureaucracy, no hidden fees, no going to a shop, and no dealing with the horror of modern telephone companies. An added bonus is that if your billing address is outside the European Union, your purchase is tax free.</p>
<p>European mobile phones cost more to call, but it's better if your kid just calls you using Skype. Calling North American mobile phones is 2 cents a minute just like land lines. For those families with excess cash on hand that they want to spend on unnecessary extras, Skype offers those for you as well. The website offers an array of fashionable handsets, accessories, services and other miscellaneous items on which money can be spent, if you're into that sort of thing. However the main draw is dirt cheap calling overseas.</p>
<p>Skype is great for making calls from Europe to the US. However it's not all that easy to tote around your computer for day to day calls :) When DS did study abroad, the university arranged for them to have cell phones from a European carrier. The costs were nominal and the phones easily charged at most any convenience store. To be honest, we just use IM or email to communicate with him. With the time change, phone calls weren't all that easy to schedule.</p>
<p>S was gone for a year. We used SKYPE almost exclusively. It was a twelve hour time change so it was actually pretty good. I can see how Europe would not be as convenient. Skype is amazing. We'll use it for college this fall; we'll be in the same time zone thankfully.
He did change his sim card once he was over there; convenient (and cheaper!) to call local friends.</p>
<p>Depends on where she will be -- do you want to say? Some of us might have info or links.</p>
<p>She'll be in France. There will be 42 students in her program and they'll be going on a number of planned visits to many other European countries during the year. So the students need to be able to call each other and they need to be able to access U.S. callers.</p>
<p>A few comments:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>if you are taking a US cell phone with you and plan to buy a sim card locally, this will only work if TWO conditions are met: (1) it must be a GSM phone. That means no Cingular phones, which are CDMA. (2) it must be unlocked. Most phones in the US are sold locked, meaning sim cards from other carriers will not work, including any in Europe. You can often download an unlocking code from the internet for a few dollars, though.</p></li>
<li><p>roaming costs if you take your US phone overseas are exhorbitant: Europe is at least $1/minute (memories of 15 years ago?). Triple that for India and China.</p></li>
<li><p>Skype is a bargain and can work fine. I've used it for business calls all over asia. My D has been in Bolivia for the summer, and that is the way we talk. If she's at an internet cafe, we'll skype (yes, used as a verb) for free. Sometimes the delay is a pain, frequently not. At her apartment, we'll call her land line using "skype out" for about $0.12/minute, and the call quality has without exception been like a regular landline call.</p></li>
<li><p>a few neat features of skype are: cheap or free conference calling; chat and file transfers.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>A number of students have used a company called PicCell Wireless for their overseas cell phone service. A few of the services they offer have made them really convenient, and they are reasonably priced.
The website is: <a href="http://www.piccellwireless.com%5B/url%5D">www.piccellwireless.com</a>
- Many received free GSM mobile phone rentals (saving from standard $5-$11 per month) - Standard round-trip shipping included if you order their phone at least 14 days prior to the requested delivery date. This depends on which program they are going on and if this has been negotiated for them.
- Local rates and service for each country (with free incoming calls in most countries)
- Standard round-trip shipping included within the US
- English-speaking Customer service in the US and globally. Please see their website: <a href="http://www.piccellwireless.com%5B/url%5D">www.piccellwireless.com</a>
- Students rent phone for as long as they like
- Order and receive the phone in the US prior to departure
- All phones are returned directly to PicCell Wireless in the US – return shipping is included</p>
<p>My D used PicCell during her recent stay in Spain, as did many others in the program. It was very convenient, easy to arrange, terrific service (more clear than when I speak to her via her hometown cell and she's only an hour away!), and economical. Highly recommended from this house.</p>
<p>Thanks, everybody! Great info.</p>
<p>you can purchase an unlocked phone thru amazon.com before she leaves and she can pickup a local SIM card, which comes in handy to keep in touch with local friends/students also on the trip. Also, if not using skype consider adding an international calling plan to your land line -- its ~$6-8/mo., depending on carrier, and allows calls to Europe for pennies per minute.</p>
<p>That's not true about Cingular, which is now the new AT&T. AT&T provides the unlock code to its customers for use on their own cell phones, and the customer, can therefore, in fact, buy a sim card in Europe and use it in their own AT&T phone. By using the foreign sim card, it brings the rate down from $.99 per minute to as low as $.08 (this is for roaming). With SKYPE, doesn't it have to be used from a computer - therefore, if someone wishes to call the US from other than the computer, then it's somewhat limited - meaning that the person always has to be at the computer to make the call.</p>
<p>Our Cingular (AT&T) phones worked just fine in Europe, much better than here in the US.</p>
<p>D was abroad for 7 months in SE Asia and Australia. While in Australia, the kids all got local cellphones. (D's Cingular phone is only operable in certain cities and certain countries, so call them to inquire about where it will work that apply to your kid. Also, be careful because sometimes they'll tell you it "should work" but doesn't when you actually get there.)</p>
<p>We've become avid believers in Skype which works great when you have a computer-to-computer conversation. All we did was make sure that each computer had the necessary headphones (D's was built in) and downloaded the software for free. We tried it out at home before she left. However she had to re-download it from the country she was actually in. Anyway, the sound quality was outstanding. We also often used Skype's version of IM, an unexpected little plus.</p>
<p>This is a fabulous thread. So much info. Appreciate everyone's details. Wish this could be a sticky for future reference. Worried that this will be hard to find in 6 months, when we'll need it.</p>
<p>Have your child network with others from her school who have been there. My niece used a cell phone that had had other owners as it was passed along to the next one going to Europe.</p>
<p>Jajah is computer based like Skype, but you only use your computer to set up the call. Your home phone (or any phone you designate) rings, you pick it up and Jajah rings the phone of the person you are calling. You are then connected (through internet) but using telephones and you are not tied to your computer. D is in China presently. We talk for 30 minutes, crystal clear, no lag and it costs us something like 78 cents for the half hour call. Different countries, different rates. It is incredible.</p>