Paying for Cellphone Service When Traveling Abroad

Hello! There are a ton of things I could talk about my trip to Italy in terms of cost and such (everywhere we went, wine was essentially the same cost as a soda), but the one very last minute thing I did the day before my trip was to pay $40 to activate a global phone plan, which gave me 100 minutes, 100 text messages, and 100MB of data (my provider is Verizon).

The Times’s Frugal Traveler, Seth Kugel, has a very good overview about the various ways to navigate phone use while traveling overseas (sticking to Wi-Fi, getting a data-only SIM card, etc.), but for my trip, it was good to know that I could call Roberto, the person who was giving us our house keys after we landed, to let us know that we had arrived and if we were experiencing any issues.

My pals and I often got lost looking for various restaurants and attractions we wanted to see so being able to pull up Google maps was extremely helpful. I also used my data to pull up train times and email with an organizer who was putting together a day of wine tasting for us. Since I had 100MB of data to use, I only turned it on to use when we absolutely needed it; I ended up using half of my allotted amount for the whole trip:

So: the last-minute $40 I spent to activate this plan was totally worth it and I would use it again for a similar trip (one of my pals also brought an international phone, so we often tag-teamed to look up info). The place we were staying at also had Wi-Fi access, so we often looked up what we needed before heading out for the day, but of course, things happen, and being able to use our phones prevented some headaches.

What about you? What have you phone use experiences been like when you’ve traveled abroad?

Photo: Mario Mancuso

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