Ex-Airbalancer Posted June 24 #101 Share Posted June 24 1 hour ago, calliopecruiser said: There is no voice service (i.e. phone) with an eSIM like Airalo. You can do WiFi calling with apps other than WhatsApp, but the lack of phone calls is the only weak spot for eSIMS. It not esims , it’s Airalo that does want to provide the voice service as you can get esims with Bell, Rogers , Vodaphone etc and they all provided voice 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calliopecruiser Posted June 25 #102 Share Posted June 25 13 hours ago, Ex-Airbalancer said: as you can get esims with Bell, Rogers , Vodaphone etc and they all provided voice They're also only available if they are your cellphone carrier and you want to pay their roaming rates - but that's not what this discussion is about. It's about using local carriers around the world so we don't have to pay outrageous Canadian roaming charges. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ex-Airbalancer Posted June 25 #103 Share Posted June 25 6 hours ago, calliopecruiser said: They're also only available if they are your cellphone carrier and you want to pay their roaming rates - but that's not what this discussion is about. It's about using local carriers around the world so we don't have to pay outrageous Canadian roaming charges. The point I was making you wrote the esims have a problem with voice calls, I wrote it isn’t esims but the provider it is crazy to pay a Canadian provider $15 a day for their service when out of the country I will check out Freedom , international plans before our next trip to Portugal or go with Vodafone travellers package Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare CDNPolar Posted June 26 #104 Share Posted June 26 23 hours ago, Ex-Airbalancer said: The point I was making you wrote the esims have a problem with voice calls, I wrote it isn’t esims but the provider it is crazy to pay a Canadian provider $15 a day for their service when out of the country I will check out Freedom , international plans before our next trip to Portugal or go with Vodafone travellers package I get this... but I have been with Rogers for ever and ever and we have really good packages. I am not going to change provider for a trip. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ex-Airbalancer Posted June 26 #105 Share Posted June 26 38 minutes ago, CDNPolar said: I get this... but I have been with Rogers for ever and ever and we have really good packages. I am not going to change provider for a trip. I change providers when I can get a cheaper rate 😁 I just think it is crazy to pay a Canadian provider $15 a day for international roaming 😉 I also don’t buy cellphones , the last cellphone I bought was in 2014 , now I just get my kids old phone , I just got an iPhone 12 from my son so I am good for another 3 years 🤣 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calliopecruiser Posted June 26 #106 Share Posted June 26 11 hours ago, Ex-Airbalancer said: I just think it is crazy to pay a Canadian provider $15 a day for international roaming So do I, which is why I don't. But I also don't change cell phone providers every time I take a trip. Local SIM cards, or global eSIMs are my preferences. I also don’t buy cellphones Well, you don't buy cellphones for yourself, at least. (Maybe you don't buy your son's.....I assumed you did, but I realize I don't know how old you and he are.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ex-Airbalancer Posted June 26 #107 Share Posted June 26 47 minutes ago, calliopecruiser said: So do I, which is why I don't. But I also don't change cell phone providers every time I take a trip. Local SIM cards, or global eSIMs are my preferences. I also don’t buy cellphones Well, you don't buy cellphones for yourself, at least. (Maybe you don't buy your son's.....I assumed you did, but I realize I don't know how old you and he are.) why would you have change change cellphone providers for every trip ? 🤔 With Freedom plan , you could get international plan for $45 month ,( you need to activate for 3 months) keep your Canadian number , not leaving the country down grade to less expensive plan My son only has 3 years and he is retiring from the military 🤣 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calliopecruiser Posted June 27 #108 Share Posted June 27 3 hours ago, Ex-Airbalancer said: why would you have change change cellphone providers for every trip ? Because my current provider doesn't offer that. Good cell service in my rural area is pretty spotty as it is, and a budget carrier isn't a company I'd trust. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ex-Airbalancer Posted June 27 #109 Share Posted June 27 8 hours ago, calliopecruiser said: Because my current provider doesn't offer that. Good cell service in my rural area is pretty spotty as it is, and a budget carrier isn't a company I'd trust. With Freedom , they did use Bell towers in their nationwide system, I am not sure if they switch to Rogers when Rogers bought Shaws In Rural areas , it either good or bad at our house both Bell and Rogers are crap 😁 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brimarl Posted June 27 #110 Share Posted June 27 12 hours ago, calliopecruiser said: Because my current provider doesn't offer that. Good cell service in my rural area is pretty spotty as it is, and a budget carrier isn't a company I'd trust. Budget carriers in Canada are mostly just sub tiers of the main carrier. IE Telus, Koodoo, Public Mobile. Depends what your plan provides but other than that it's customer service that goes from bad, to very bad to none. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bookbabe Posted July 10 #111 Share Posted July 10 On 6/24/2024 at 8:53 AM, calliopecruiser said: There is no voice service (i.e. phone) with an eSIM like Airalo. You can do WiFi calling with apps other than WhatsApp, but the lack of phone calls is the only weak spot for eSIMS. Not quite true. Airalo has a voice phone option available for their Global (Discover+) plan. I know, because we have it. The negative is that it sets you up with (in our case) an Austrian phone number, but we have used it to call Canada without issue. For our elderly moms, we called them from the number first so they could just press that number in the recent calls log to call us if they needed to. Since then, we’ve got them using WhatsApp so it’s no longer an issue, but we were definitely able to make and receive phone calls with the Discover+ plan on Airalo. No idea if you can do call forwarding to that number from your home or regular cell phone, we’ve never tried. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
curlerguy Posted July 11 #112 Share Posted July 11 We will be in Italy and Croatia for 15 days. I'm thinking of an esim to use predominantly for google maps and google translate. We have wifi on board on can use that for email etc. Which esim is recommended? How many GB's would be adequate for our use? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fouremco Posted July 11 #113 Share Posted July 11 2 hours ago, curlerguy said: We will be in Italy and Croatia for 15 days. I'm thinking of an esim to use predominantly for google maps and google translate. We have wifi on board on can use that for email etc. Which esim is recommended? How many GB's would be adequate for our use? I've no recommendations on which esim to buy, but don't forget that both Google maps and Google translate can be used offline. If that's all you plan on using the esim for, you could skip buying one. I regularly use the Google maps offline for turn-by-turn directions when renting cars in foreign countries, downloading the required map area at home before the trip. I've not tried the offline translation, but it appears quite easy and, like the maps, you just need to download the languages that you are likely to need before you start your trip. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare CDNPolar Posted July 13 #114 Share Posted July 13 On 7/11/2024 at 1:20 PM, curlerguy said: We will be in Italy and Croatia for 15 days. I'm thinking of an esim to use predominantly for google maps and google translate. We have wifi on board on can use that for email etc. Which esim is recommended? How many GB's would be adequate for our use? On a recent multi-country 12 day river cruise through Europe, I bought a 5GB Airalo eSIM for $20 bucks. I did not even come close to using the data - perhaps only half. You can also with these plans now monitor your data usage on their app and add if necessary. I used it solely for maps, navigation, and just basic Google needs to find businesses or restaurants. I get what @Fouremco is saying about maps, but we just like the freedom to be able to have access to anything that data could give us when we are travelling. We DO NOT pay Rogers for their Roam Like Home - that is highway robbery - so we are without our primary phone number for these trips and rely on WhatsApp to keep in touch. Our friends and family - that we want to keep in touch with - know when we are away and that WhatsApp is our link to home. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NateUpNorth Posted July 22 #115 Share Posted July 22 On 7/13/2024 at 7:12 AM, CDNPolar said: On a recent multi-country 12 day river cruise through Europe, I bought a 5GB Airalo eSIM for $20 bucks. I did not even come close to using the data - perhaps only half. You can also with these plans now monitor your data usage on their app and add if necessary. I used it solely for maps, navigation, and just basic Google needs to find businesses or restaurants. I get what @Fouremco is saying about maps, but we just like the freedom to be able to have access to anything that data could give us when we are travelling. We DO NOT pay Rogers for their Roam Like Home - that is highway robbery - so we are without our primary phone number for these trips and rely on WhatsApp to keep in touch. Our friends and family - that we want to keep in touch with - know when we are away and that WhatsApp is our link to home. Quick basic question if I may: SIM goes into the phone and gets set up from there? No worries about your phone mistakenly using the CAD plan? (be gentle people, not a tech person here LOL) Do you know/have access to the "number" you'll be using ahead of time with Airalo? (so we can advise on the whatsapp number ahead of time to those we need to stay in contact with.) We're getting something like this for exactly the purposes you've outlined above Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bookbabe Posted July 22 #116 Share Posted July 22 (edited) 33 minutes ago, NateUpNorth said: Quick basic question if I may: SIM goes into the phone and gets set up from there? No worries about your phone mistakenly using the CAD plan? (be gentle people, not a tech person here LOL) Do you know/have access to the "number" you'll be using ahead of time with Airalo? (so we can advise on the whatsapp number ahead of time to those we need to stay in contact with.) We're getting something like this for exactly the purposes you've outlined above Your phone has to be able to use an eSim, which is a code you enter rather than an actual physical SIM card. Google your phone model plus the word eSim and you should be able to tell if it’ll work. In your phone’s settings, there will be a spot, likely under Cellular, where you turn on and off the different phone numbers. When you leave Canada, as you are putting your phone in airplane mode for the plane ride, you just turn off the CAD number and turn on the Airalo one. Then do the reverse on the way home. Whether it will work before you leave depends on what plan you buy. If Canada isn’t a part of that plan, then no, you won’t have access to the number or data until you get there. However, you don’t need to know your Airalo number to set up WhatsApp. You use your Canadian number as your username, and that makes it so that no matter what phone number or data plan (or even just hotel or ship wifi) is active, people WhatsApp your regular number to get in touch with you. In fact, you HAVE to set that up when you have your CAD phone working because they will text you an authentication code to confirm the number. WhatsApp is a program rather than a phone service, so it works like FB or Cruise Critic where you log in with the same username (or in the case of WhatsApp, phone number) and password no matter what device you are using or where in the world you are using it from. But, just like FB or Cruise Critic, you can only contact other people who are on FB or CC, so you have to have friends/family set up WhatsApp too. That help at all? Edited July 22 by bookbabe 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare CDNPolar Posted July 22 #117 Share Posted July 22 28 minutes ago, NateUpNorth said: Quick basic question if I may: SIM goes into the phone and gets set up from there? No worries about your phone mistakenly using the CAD plan? (be gentle people, not a tech person here LOL) Do you know/have access to the "number" you'll be using ahead of time with Airalo? (so we can advise on the whatsapp number ahead of time to those we need to stay in contact with.) We're getting something like this for exactly the purposes you've outlined above Don't worry, I'll be gentle... This eSIM thing took me a while. First, the Airalo is an eSIM not a physical SIM, which means that it is a QR Code that you scan on your phone and your phone installs it as a "Virtual" SIM. Your phone - if compatible with eSIM's - then understands that you have 2 SIM's installed and in your settings you can turn OFF your CAD number and plan. Note however that this eSIM does not give you calling options, it is a data only that I purchase. This gives me WhatsApp calling, data and internet searching, Email, Google maps, and iMessage between iPhones. Ask more questions. The WhatsApp number that you use is still your home cell number. WhatsApp is a data driven App for phone calling - it is not a cellular phone call. As long as you have data or Wifi when travelling you can WhatsApp call. Your friends and family just need to know that you are travelling and they can reach you via email or WhatsApp Chat or Calls. These friends and family however all have to have WhatsApp installed. We send an email to critical friends and family in advance of travelling telling them that we are reachable by WhatsApp while away. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare CDNPolar Posted July 22 #118 Share Posted July 22 Haha @bookbabe and I were typing our answers at the same time! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bookbabe Posted July 22 #119 Share Posted July 22 3 minutes ago, CDNPolar said: Note however that this eSIM does not give you calling options, it is a data only that I purchase. This gives me WhatsApp calling, data and internet searching, Email, Google maps, and iMessage between iPhones. I’ll just add on to this part that some Airalo plans, specifically the Global+ ones, do give you a phone number in addition to data. So if you need a phone number, you have to pick one of the Airalo plans that includes one, it’s not automatic. We have the Global+ plan, which gives us more data in more countries and a full year to use it, because we go on multiple trips a year to different destinations. If you are only traveling once for a shorter trip, and to a smaller number of countries, one of the local or regional plans might be a more economical choice. @CDNPolar great minds think alike…. LOL 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NateUpNorth Posted July 22 #120 Share Posted July 22 (edited) Amazing and thank you both @bookbabe @CDNPolar!! Exactly what I was trying to figure out. Maps and Whatsapp are exactly what we need, so I'll research the phone and compatibility with ESim's. If compatible will go with an Airaol....... if not I'll get a physical SIM from someone like Orange Travel or Sim Corner! Edited July 22 by NateUpNorth 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare CDNPolar Posted July 22 #121 Share Posted July 22 Agree with @bookbabe re the phone number part, but I guess that I don't really pay attention to getting a phone number because the use is restrictive and must meet your requirements. There is however a consideration that while travelling if you want to use your phone to call a restaurant or a tour operator that does not offer a WhatsApp number then you are restricted without a number. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bookbabe Posted July 22 #122 Share Posted July 22 1 minute ago, CDNPolar said: Agree with @bookbabe re the phone number part, but I guess that I don't really pay attention to getting a phone number because the use is restrictive and must meet your requirements. There is however a consideration that while travelling if you want to use your phone to call a restaurant or a tour operator that does not offer a WhatsApp number then you are restricted without a number. Yeah, that’s the only reason we got the Global+ rather than just the Global. The only downside is that the number is from Austria, so occasionally people think we’re a spammer and don’t answer. The upside is that we renew the plan every year rather than letting it lapse and getting a new plan (and thus a new number) each trip, so most of the relevant friends and family now have that number in their contacts as us. We travel a lot, so in addition to our regular home (Cayman) cell numbers, we have a Mint US monthly plan and the Airalo Global+ for the rest of the world. LOL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare CDNPolar Posted July 22 #123 Share Posted July 22 1 hour ago, bookbabe said: Yeah, that’s the only reason we got the Global+ rather than just the Global. The only downside is that the number is from Austria, so occasionally people think we’re a spammer and don’t answer. The upside is that we renew the plan every year rather than letting it lapse and getting a new plan (and thus a new number) each trip, so most of the relevant friends and family now have that number in their contacts as us. We travel a lot, so in addition to our regular home (Cayman) cell numbers, we have a Mint US monthly plan and the Airalo Global+ for the rest of the world. LOL. Does this Austria number allow you to call anywhere in the world under the plan? No additional fees? I am struggling now because I have recently launched my own business and want to be connected when travelling by phone, but will NOT pay Rogers $15 per day for Roam Like Home. I also want clients to be able to call a North American number when trying to reach me. Complicated. I think that one day we will all buy eSIM's for our phones and have global calling much cheaper than Rogers Roam Like Home. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bookbabe Posted July 22 #124 Share Posted July 22 54 minutes ago, CDNPolar said: Does this Austria number allow you to call anywhere in the world under the plan? No additional fees? I am struggling now because I have recently launched my own business and want to be connected when travelling by phone, but will NOT pay Rogers $15 per day for Roam Like Home. I also want clients to be able to call a North American number when trying to reach me. Complicated. I think that one day we will all buy eSIM's for our phones and have global calling much cheaper than Rogers Roam Like Home. As far as we can tell, we can call anywhere in any of the countries covered under the Global+ listing. We’ve definitely called Canada and the US with it. More complicated to call, need to use all the international calling codes and such. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ex-Airbalancer Posted July 22 #125 Share Posted July 22 1 hour ago, CDNPolar said: Does this Austria number allow you to call anywhere in the world under the plan? No additional fees? I am struggling now because I have recently launched my own business and want to be connected when travelling by phone, but will NOT pay Rogers $15 per day for Roam Like Home. I also want clients to be able to call a North American number when trying to reach me. Complicated. I think that one day we will all buy eSIM's for our phones and have global calling much cheaper than Rogers Roam Like Home. You would think if Freedom can offer why does the big 3 also have a reasonable price plan 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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