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audreyh1 · 03-09-2018, 08:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chuckanut

I joined the T-Mobile 55+ crowd today. I really liked Ting's service and their pricing was good. But, I did not like having to watch my data usage. T-Mobile will be about $4 a month more but with unlimited data (well above 50 gigs it might be throttled, I have never come close to using 50 gigs). I'll chalk up the extra $4 a month to the "Blough that dough" philosophy. Last of the big spenders, I am.

One question for the international travelers: Is there anything I need to do before hand to make sure than when I step of the plane in Rome, Paris, London, Sophia, etc. my phone will be working?

No. Once the plane has landed, and you take your phone off of airplane mode, T-Mobile will send you a friendly text message saying something like “Welcome to Italy, you are now blah, blah, free data, texting and 20c* a minute calls.” After that your phone will work completely before even stepping off the plane.

*you can avoid this charge for calls to/from US if you use WiFi calling via WiFi internet access from hotel, cafe or wherever.

nwsteve · 03-09-2018, 08:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chuckanut

I joined the T-Mobile 55+ crowd today. I really liked Ting's service and their pricing was good. But, I did not like having to watch my data usage. T-Mobile will be about $4 a month more but with unlimited data (well above 50 gigs it might be throttled, I have never come close to using 50 gigs). I'll chalk up the extra $4 a month to the "Blough that dough" philosophy. Last of the big spenders, I am.

One question for the international travelers: Is there anything I need to do before hand to make sure than when I step of the plane in Rome, Paris, London, Sophia, etc. my phone will be working?

We have used TMobile intl services in china last year--got great reception from the Great Wall to even 2 bars on the Yangtze in the Gorge except in the narrowest portions
Also did well on a river cruise from Amsterdam to Budapest .
Only effort required to keep charged and turn on ;-)

audreyh1 · 03-09-2018, 08:57 PM

It’s fun crossing international borders by train and having the phone ping me with the friendly “Welcome to XXX” message from T-Mobile.

Ha ha - I even get that around here if I get too close to the border.

explanade · 03-09-2018, 09:42 PM

You should not.

And if you do have problems, you can also try the T-Mobile support twitter account.

I actually used it once from abroad.

You have to make sure data roaming is ON.

audreyh1 · 03-10-2018, 05:12 AM

Oh yeah and you want to make sure your phone can pick up all carriers, not just limited to one.

That should be the default setting.

audreyh1 · 03-10-2018, 05:20 AM

We called T-mobile support from Barcelona once because our phones weren’t registering as data devices with the local network Movistar. A very nice technical support person walked us through a few steps that reconfigured something. And our phones were back full online.

This was the only time we ever had trouble, and we’d just traveled through the Netherlands and all of southern France with no problems. Had no problems previous years either.

explanade · 03-10-2018, 10:42 AM

Yeah I don't know if they'd charge you for 611 calls while roaming.

There have been times when I had to reboot my iPhone.

Sometimes, I have it scan for carriers manually. The default setting is automatic and it will connect and roam on a carrier which may or may not have the best coverage.

So I would take it off automatic and see what other carriers show up. Sometime you know a given carrier is suppose to have the best network in a given country so you try to force it to use that one, if automatic setting doesn't choose that one.

Chuckanut · 04-03-2018, 09:58 PM

With the age 55 plan, is the International speed acceptable? I notice it is 128kps. Is that fast enough?

explanade · 04-03-2018, 10:53 PM

For light surfing and using Google maps, some email, it's okay.

I couldn't use only that speed for the whole trip though, so you'd want good wifi at the place you're staying.

audreyh1 · 04-04-2018, 06:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chuckanut

With the age 55 plan, is the International speed acceptable? I notice it is 128kps. Is that fast enough?

It should be fine for small stuff out and about like updating maps, goggle searches, email etc. You’ll probably get higher than that in the city as it defaults to higher speeds if the lowest isn’t available.

Save the intense web surfing for back at the hotel or somewhere with decent WiFi. Even some trains have WiFi. Most airports, etc.

In all our Europe travels we never ended up buying the high speed package that is available.

audreyh1 · 04-04-2018, 06:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by explanade

Yeah I don't know if they'd charge you for 611 calls while roaming.

Well they did on one to our surprise. But not on the other because I was using WiFi calling.

Well actually I don’t think we dialed 611 but called some technical support number directly.

**braumeister** · 04-04-2018, 06:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1

It should be fine for small stuff out and about like updating maps, google searches, email etc. You’ll probably get higher than that in the city as it defaults to higher speeds if the lowest isn’t available.

+1
I've never had the slightest problem with the speed. So far in England, Scotland, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Czechia, and Switzerland. In some cases it even beats the wifi available!

Chuckanut · 04-04-2018, 09:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1

It should be fine for small stuff out and about like updating maps, goggle searches, email etc. You’ll probably get higher than that in the city as it defaults to higher speeds if the lowest isn’t available.

Save the intense web surfing for back at the hotel or somewhere with decent WiFi. Even some trains have WiFi. Most airports, etc.

In all our Europe travels we never ended up buying the high speed package that is available.

Grazie tutti! I will save maps and other big items ahead of time either at home or via hotel wifi.

explanade · 04-04-2018, 11:01 AM

Hotel wifi can be poor. It rarely exceeds 10 Mbps and often is under 5 Mbps.

If I stay more than 3 days in a country I will buy a prepaid SIM for my iPad, which can be used to connect other devices.

For a day or two, T-Mobile will have to suffice.

jonat · 04-05-2018, 02:56 PM

Note that if you pay the $10 extra for "Plus", you get 256Kb/s. I never had a problem with T-M data during my multi-country European trip last fall, other than in Reykjavik, where I sometimes couldn't get a signal at all.

explanade · 04-05-2018, 03:25 PM

Yeah I have the Plus on one of my lines but not both. It's $10 extra per line.

I got the Plus mainly for the other benefit, which is 10 GB of full speed hot spot use, rather than 3G hot spot speeds.

audreyh1 · 04-05-2018, 03:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by explanade

Hotel wifi can be poor. It rarely exceeds 10 Mbps and often is under 5 Mbps.

If I stay more than 3 days in a country I will buy a prepaid SIM for my iPad, which can be used to connect other devices.

For a day or two, T-Mobile will have to suffice.

We have rarely had trouble with hotel WiFi in Europe unless out in the sticks, but then we’re not trying to watch video either.

You can buy a certain number of days of international high speed from T-mobile if really needed, but your total data limit probably wouldn’t support a lot of video either.

audreyh1 · 04-05-2018, 03:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jonat

Note that if you pay the $10 extra for "Plus", you get 256Kb/s. I never had a problem with T-M data during my multi-country European trip last fall, other than in Reykjavik, where I sometimes couldn't get a signal at all.

That’s what we ultimately got as part of a free promo package.

But we were fine with the original lower speed version too.