<p>My daughter is studying in Spain (Madrid/Seville) this summer and we are looking at the best options to keep in touch. She has an iphone and ipad, with AT&T service but I am unsure of how they will work in Spain. Does anyone have any advice or suggestions on where and what I should research? Thanks.</p>
<p>Skype will work.</p>
<p>My D is also going to Madrid this summer for study abroad. We haven’t worked out everything but the advice she has received is to buy a cheap phone over there. The group of students are all going to buy the same phone/plan so they can keep in touch. She has been told that she can use it to call the US. </p>
<p>Also I’m not sure how it works but she had used viber on her current phone to keep in touch with other students from Europe over the winter break. I don’t know if that would work on her phone from the US over there. I like the idea of a phone from there because if she loses or her current phone gets stolen then we may have to pay a large fee to replace.</p>
<p>Ditto to Skype. Set up accounts on both your and her computers/phones/whatever - practice using it before she goes so you know what to expect. The picture is often grainy, the sound is often delayed, the price (free!) is always perfect. :)</p>
<p>Skype, It worked for us with DD2 in Japan. The hard part is matching schedules for when you’ll all be available.</p>
<p>Skype is by far the easiest. It even worked in Jordan! Our son called us, we figured out a time that usually worked, he emailed us or told us the week before if the time had to be rescheduled. He also had a local phone that he used in country, and we could call him on that without him getting charged.</p>
<p>If she brings the iphone, make sure she turns off the phone and data functionality. Too many horror stories of $1000 phone bills without making a single call.</p>
<p>Our son is coming back from Madrid after a semester there today. We kept in touch with both email and Skype. He took his iphone over but only used it for wifi access. He did purchase a phone over there mainly to keep in touch with his friends who were there too. We were also able to keep tabs on him via Facebook.</p>
<p>iPhone is all but worthless UNLESS it is jail broken. A converted IPhone will accept a local SIM card and replace the need to buy a cheap local phone. The newer the iPhone, the harder it gets. </p>
<p>All in all, getting WiFi is important. Should be easy at home. The iPad can use a local microsim chip. They are a bit harder to find but it is doable. El Corte Ingles should have them. Before leaving, create Google Voice accounts, and one of the programs that create voice on the IPad. Then have the iPhone number forwarded to Google Voice. This creates a perfect loop. </p>
<p>For messages, the iPad with the new IOS will work well. The iMessage should work. Sending international messages with a local SIM might be expensive, and best avoided using CELL data. </p>
<p>There are places for free Wifi in Madrid. The entire Puerta del Sol should be free, as well as other places.</p>
<p>All in all, the weak link is the IPhone in its original state.</p>
<p>Skype. You can get it on your phone, too, and use your phone as a…well…phone lol. No need to buy a cell phone, really.</p>
<p>Another consideration is banking. M daughter did study abroad and her bank did not have a sister bank in her country, so anytime she wanted cash it was going to be expensive. So we rsearched and found a bank here that had a sister bank with lots of branches in her country. We set up a checking with small saving account attached so no fees. And most importantly, no fees overseas for ATM use or money conversion feesin her acount, which if she had gone with old bank would have really added up.</p>
<p>She kept old account as well, as they had sister banks in other countries she traveled to. Five or ten bucks worth of fees and conversion costs add up to a college kid,it’s a meal!!!</p>
<p>As for connecting up, we did single a few times, mostly it was email through the schools computer area or her laptop sung schools wifi.</p>
<p>The program preferred they all use the schools cheap phone program as they found it easier to be sure everyone had a phone, they could contact in emergency, they had a kind of phone tree set up. It worked greatmand was designed for travel from country to cpuntry.</p>
<p>And everything,e they move locations turn off the phone and back on. Uber important to cut down costs from roaming.</p>
<p>My D is also going to Spain - we are planning on Skype/Facetime and she is going to pickup a prepaid phone once she gets there - she can top it off as she goes. The kids that she knows that have done this before say it is the least expensive way to get phone service. We also use Facebook to connect/chat.</p>
<p>We keep in touch with our daughter in Thailand through email and Skype. Skype is fabulous! And it’s free on the internet. I would not do a phone, because the international rates are so high. But I would recommend that she get a local cell phone once she gets there because they’re just as important abroad as they are here. They can be much cheaper than an international plan, and they can be bought without a contract.</p>
<p>My son has been in France since January, and we have been fine communicating mainly by email, and occasionally by Skype. He bought a cheap prepaid phone there, just for communicating with friends he made there. He hasn’t called us once, though he could use the phone to call us in an emergency.</p>
<p>He has a bank account where we do, so my husband would transfer money into his account when he needed it. And there was a sister bank there, so no problem accessing funds.</p>
<p>I was a little worried about the lack of access when he first went, but really, it’s been fine!!</p>
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<p>As long as you have a web connection … thru WiFi or cellular data. For an extended stay, it is crucial to get a local access. Hence the need to buy a cheap local phone or use a phone that accepts a local SIM card. A “converted” iPhone works well, but so does a workhorse phone such as the Motorola Razr. </p>
<p>And, fwiw, it is also good to remember that Skype can be a battery drain on a cellular phone. </p>
<p>The good news is that many countries have started to offer reasonable service on a prepaid basis. I was able to get 2GIG of data, unlimited text, and 80 minutes of talk time for 20 Euros in the Benelux. It is, however, quite a bit more expensive in Spain. I think you need to spend about 8 Euros for 500 Meg of data with a provider such as Yoigo with texts at around 10 cents. </p>
<p>No matter how one looks at it, a cell phone in Europe is not really made for endless yapping! :)</p>
<p>My daughter did a semester in Spain last summer…both of those cities and also one other. Skype is good as long as there is internet service. It was pretty spotty . It worked best when she was on the university campus…not so well where she resided</p>
<p>You have the option of purchasing a GSM Quadband phone and sim card here in the US , or if you have an unlocked GSMquadband phone you can just purchase the sim card. Other threads on CC have mentioned cellular abroad website.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the info. I really appreciate all the advice and thoughts. I believe she already has Skype, so I’ll just need to create an account for myself.</p>
<p>My son arrived in Nantes, France yesterday. So far I’ve had three phone calls and about a half dozens texts from him with no problem. As a previous poster mentioned, he’s using an iPhone app called Viber which allows for free calls and texts. He has the newest iPhone and can make phone calls and receive texts from the states or to others in Europe with no problem. The data is where the big charges can add up. He knows to use Viber first and if he needs to call someone who doesn’t have Viber that he should keep it short. But, he’s a boy so that’s not a big concern for us! He’s also done an iChat with my husband with no problems. Viber works on iPhone, Android, or Blackberry.</p>
<p>Viper is a free app. We downloaded it on both of our i-phones, and D and I can talk and message whenever she has free wifi. There is no charge. We used Skype on a trip to France recently but had to pay for the phone usage on that.</p>
<p>Edit: bkbmom cross posted, but basically said it all. Viper works well, but people have to download the app.</p>
<p>Also, there is a thing called Mobal Phone, which is a phone that you purchase online and then do a pay-as-you-go thing. I bought one years ago. The calls aren’t cheap (I want to say $1.39/minute) but we sent this with D as her emergency phone. She can use it to call anywhere, but we hope she won’t need it.</p>