Still confused about smart phone use on my trip in two weeks!

diane,

It's late and I'm not thinking too clearly, but I'll try to answer your questions.....

• Rather than place the phone in "Airplane mode", why not just disable the cellular data? I use an iPhone but assume they have the same type of system on Android phones? That will leave the voice and text sections of your phone active.
• As you noted, I believe What's App can only be used with others that also have the App. That may limit exactly who you can send texts to.
• I doubt that you'll be able to get incoming calls on Skype, since you'd have to be in a Wi-Fi area for that to work. If you're travelling with your home number, your B&B hosts would have to dial a long distance call to the U.S. to reach you.
• You'll only be able to use an Italian SIM card if your phone is unlocked. Is that the case?
• Your maps and other information should still be on the phone if you change SIM cards. Only information on your "home" SIM card will be absent (it's sometimes possible to store phone numbers on the SIM, although I don't think anyone does that anymore).
• You'll have to buy the Italian SIM card in Italy (AFAIK). You'll need to register with your Passport to purchase the card.
• If you want to use a different SIM card, you could also use a SIM from one of the "travel phone" firms.

dear confused -

(BTW - Ken, it isn't late, it is early, and now middle of the day - ain't tag-team great?)

WhatsApp only corresponds with other WhatsApp apps. If you have wifi it doesn't care if you WhatsApp text or WhatsApp voice. It all gets sent the same way. They look like voice messages and look like texts but they aren't. CAREFUL though, I just saw a girl on TV who got a £3,000 bill for a week in Greece, and she said on TV that all she did was WhatsApp her friends. She had forgotten to turn off cellular roaming and cellular data and what you may not know is that WhatsApp does work on 3G and 4G as well as wifi if you let it.

Remember, if you switch the device off and on, like at night, you may have a default that switches everything back on when you switch on. Be careful.

Can your hosts text you? That would be easiest and most reliable.

If all you will be receiving in calls is one from your hosts, probably they can call a US cellfone for less than a euro and whatever you have to pay to receive a roaming call will be much less than buying a new sim.

Be careful about counting on dropbox files while out and about. Remember that they are stored up in the cloud and will need data to retrieve them, either 3G or 4G, or wifi. If you pull them with 3G or 4G they will be expensive. Better to download while you are in wifi-land before you go out.

Just because somebody advertises free wifi doesn't make it fat or fast. I go to all sorts of places which advertise free wifi and often it is really really slow. I go to a department store with free wifi and it barely reached 0.1 down and unmeasurable up. When we were in Germany a couple of months ago at three small hotels with free wifi I was completely unable to read even email.

In Italy I got less than 1 down and 0.3 up. That's pretty doggy after living with ultrafast fibre speeds of 59 down and 35 up.

So be prepared for it to be slower.... Don't try to do any voip calls - like Skype with any less than 3 down and 1.5 up.

Get a good speed checker app for your device.

If you are not planning on making many calls or texts, I agree that it might be easiest to just use your US cell phone. I turn off my data, and do not use airplane mode. I limit my calls to necessary ones only, such as calling a hotel, and I send just a few texts a day. I usually end up adding about $10-$20 to my phone bill that month, but it is worth it tot me to avoid the hassle of other options. Some US companies such as AT&T have a limited international calling plan you can buy for just your trip. Just using your US cell phone works well except of course for data. I also find that I mostly only have good free wifi connections at my hotel, so relying on wifi for calls and texts could be a problem.

Many free public wifi's also block the ports for skype and other such voice apps. I use email a lot when corresponding with hotels - its fast and easy and I get a confirmation. For the small amount of calling you seem to need just use your phone and avoid the hassle of setting up an Italian one - it will be in Italian - not sure how well you speak it.

Leave your phone on - just don't answer it unless you really want to speak to the caller.

@Nigel,

YES, the tag-team system works great!

@diane,

A few additional points.....

• It would help to know which cell network you're with at home? If you'll only be using the phone occasionally during your trip, that might be the cheapest and easiest option.
• As Nigel suggested, your B&B hosts could communicate via text, which would work especially well if using your home plan as your number wouldn't change.
• I wouldn't be too concerned about using What's App as texts are usually quite cheap anyway. Also, if you're only using What's App for texts, it may limit the ability of your B&B hosts to contact you via text. With the travel plan that I use, sent texts are 69¢ each (US $) and received texts are FREE, so a small number of texts is not going to break the bank. I find that much easier than fussing about with texting app's.

Not sure if this is applicable since I don't know who your provider is, but if you have T-Mobile, depending on your rate plan you may be able to get free unlimited data in Italy. Calls are pretty inexpensive (I believe less than a dollar a minute). Not sure if this helps, but wanted to throw that out there in case you were a T-Mobile customer.

Thank you all. ! :-) My carrier is Verizon. I called today and for $25 signed up for 100 mg of data in case I need it while getting into my dropbox or a reservation question or something. Thanks for the info about turning off data. I thought airplane mode had turned it off...so I checked online and learned how to turn it off through the settings! Glad I didn't make that mistake. I've decided that the SIM card's not necessary. I'll make sure the data is turned off most the time and check my emails when I have wifi. Text messages are 50 cents to send and 5 cents to receive. Talk is $1.29/minute. Good idea to ask for text messages rather than voice calls. I will try to use Whats App with wifi, especially if I want to send a pic. I know others need to also join it and have been letting friends/family know! Verizon has an added feature of texting me for free to let me know if I am close to going over my 100 mg of data but hopefully if I am careful that won't happen. I appreciate the suggestion of "Speedtest app to check for wifi signal strength app. I downloaded it on my phone. So, I think I'm set now!

Thanks, all.

I have Verizon also and learned something our last trip. The $25.00 global data plan is per billing month. So if you trip starts the 1st, and your billing cycle ends the 10th, your bill will prorate the 10 days, then you will also pay $25.00 in advance for the upcoming month. I checked a couple Verizon bills after we returned, and the prepaid $25.00 monthly charge was not prorated as we did not receive a credit. When I set up the plan with Verizon I believe I gave them a start and end date so I didn't have to remember to call them back to change plan after our return. You may want to call Verizon back to clarify the billing and make sure are clear on turning on/off the data. We mostly just used wifi, but were glad we signed up for the data plan as the last day we were driving in our rental car, our Garmin "lost" Europe maps, and we had to rely on Google maps on our iphone.