Any seasoned travellers in that know how to get cheap mob calls in the US?

Off to New York for five days early next month (wife won a competition, excellent!) and Vodafone want to charge me £5 daily to use my UK call and data allowance. Will be calling home, doing a bit of web surfing and local calls too every day I think.

Should I just shell out or is there a cheap local SIM deal that worth having?

Cheers!

Go to AT&T store and ask them for a Sim. It’ll cost you $25 or something, and the calls won’t be particularly cheap. A data bundle will cost you more – $50 I think. You’ll need an unlocked phone though.

You could always rely on hotspots for your data..?

The vodafone thing at £5 a day is about as cheap as you’ll get.

3 contracts let you use your internet and call the uk for no extra charge in america

If you are making a lot of local calls or travelling outside the urban area then a PAYG SIM can be worth it, but I doubt it for your situation, and if you are going to be calling home then you would need international minutes. I would say, if you really are going to call home every day then the £25 to Vodafone will be cheaper than any alternatives.

If you are worried about £25, then don’t make phone calls! Like mogrips said, it’s free to use Wifi which is available at every coffee shop and hotel lobby.

Wife will be using my mob to call home too so definitely looks like the vodafone £5 deal is the way to go. I guess I shouldn’t be so tight, will no doubt end up spending like a drunken sailor on this trip anyway.

Many thanks for the help!

Use free wifi in bars/restaurants/hotel to call via Skype (calls to landlines/mobiles very cheap via Skype Credit)

Good tip on Skype, thanks, use that at the moment to call international from home computer.

I would say, if you really are going to call home every day then the £25 to Vodafone will be cheaper than any alternatives.

Why not set up Skype or some other internet-based voice system, and then look for wifi. I can’t imagine you’ll ever be short of wifi access in New York!

Downloading Skype for the phone right now 🙂

Don’t forget you’ll need at least a tri-band phone to be able to use your UK handset in the US (in some areas you’ll need a quad band handset).

Most smartphones will work on US GSM. Whilst many phones are quad band and will work on the US network standards that I can never remember (CDMA?) most UK operators don’t have roaming agreements with them so you never get to use them anyway, ime.

Wifi calls can be made on iPhone if you have iOS 8.

Just back from US. I used free hotel wifi to FaceTime the missus. I stayed in 7 different hotels. Only one had a iffy connection much better than my experience in the uk,

Just move network to 3 if ur going often. No extra charges at all!