Verizon Service

[moeferg]

Will I have any service at Grand Turk, Half Moon Cay or Freeport? What do I need to do to have the ability to call from the ship? Anyone know the rates?

[BeccaBecca1713]

While cruising on the ship, your service will be "Cellular at Sea." Don't quote me, but I think it's around $2.49/min.

 

If you have a smartphone (i.e- iPhone, Driod, Blackberry, etc...) call Verizon and work out a plan if you must keep your phone on. At the least, turn it to airplane mode, otherwise you could come home to an INSANE phone bill, because all the data that constantly pushes thru smartphones will be charged international roaming rates. Some folks have come home to bills over a thousand bucks!!

[bar1068]

It's best to "know your phone" and your carrier and rates. As was mentioned, you will have service on the ship via "Cellular at Sea" check them out at

 

http://www.cellularatsea.com

 

Knowing your phone helps alot on how to turn off international data roaming, push notifications etc. those are where lots of unseen costs come from. Also, Verizon has info here on using phones on their network while cruising

 

http://b2b.vzw.com/international/Cruise_Ships/index.html

[bguppies]

Will I have any service at Grand Turk, Half Moon Cay or Freeport? What do I need to do to have the ability to call from the ship? Anyone know the rates?

 

Not sure about Grand Turk, but HMC would probably be the ship's cell service, since they have to bring food and drinks from the ship to the island, I doubt HMC has it's own cell tower.

 

Freeport you will have Verizon's international rates.

 

Like has been stated already, be careful if you have a smartphone, and find out EXACTLY what to turn off so you don't get the insane roaming charges.

(don't be the monthly sob story in here that comes home to a $500-$1000 cell bill, because their smartphone was getting push notifications or updates.)

 

Bill

[westview1]

Definitely call Verizon. I got International Roaming for the time I was in each port. If you call them tell them what days you will be in which port and they will tell you if you can get access there and the charges. It will differ with each country. When you get on the ship and still in port, you will need to punch in a code and it will initialize the International Roaming. Just remember to turn them off once you return.

[jhale]

I just got off the phone with Verizon. They told me to turn off my data roaming to prevent the crazy charges (that I've definitely encountered before ;)) while at sea. She also set me up for an international plan for the 2 days I will be in Mexico, so I can call out, text, etc.

 

It was $2 per day for 5MB while in Mexico, and $.99 a minute to call from there.

 

Just FYI

 

And yeah, I'm one of those people that can't live without my crackberry. It's sad, I'm aware, lol.

[necruise]

Verizon may be around $1.99 per minute with International rates. I was just on the Legend on 4/17 and the in cabin phone was $.99 per minute which I thought was very reasonable. Not sure if all Carnival ships have the same rates.

[shortnsweet7676]

I added the International dialing option to my verizon plan before leaving ($3.99 per month). They showed me how to turn off my data services and told me to make sure I turned off data services once the ship left the port. Texts were 5cents to receive and 50cents to send. Calls using my cell from the ship were $2.49 per minute. Calling rates were a little cheaper in some of the ports. If you ask verizon, they can send you a list of the charges in each port or you may be able to find it on their website.

[golfadj]

Amamzing how they have us over a barrel and can charge extremely high rates.