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Best alternative for cell phone service


Rcac
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I am looking for the best alternative to cell phone service. We will be cruising with Carnival this December. My kiddos will be left back home with grandparents. I want to still have contact with them back home. It doesn't HAVE to be video chatting, but I would at least like to be able to either call them or do some sort of voice chat. I have looked into the WiFi packages, but 14 something a day seems very high. I don't need access to anything else other than some way to voice chat with my kids...We have Verizon, but they have informed me that Carnival and them have a "deal" where we won't get cell service on the ship, even if we did some form of international plan or rate...

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We recently traveled to Europe and found that Facebook calls through private messaging was a great alternative! There's wifi in multiple locations both on and off the ship in most ports and you can make a called through private messaging. It worked so well I never used my phone to call home.

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Another vote for the room phone.

 

Also, when in port, try to find a free WiFi location and maybe Skype will work.

Any of the crew will be able to tell you where the best free WiFi is.

 

I always leave a few $$$ on my Skype account to make voice calls in an emergency. The $$$ never expires and it usually works fine. Voice calls are also cheap.

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It is my understanding that Carnival's wifi does not support calling. If I am wrong let me know. If I were leaving my young children at home, I would buy the unlimited AT&T cruise ship calling and text for $100.00. I think other companies have similar plans.

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Verizon has a Travel Pass add on for international travel which you can use in port. Basically, for a $10/24 hour fee (or only $5 in Mexico), your service is activated under your existing Verizon plan. https://www.verizonwireless.com/solutions-and-services/international-travel/. You sign up for the program on-line. It is only activated when/if you turn off airplane mode in port.

 

We have used it in Bermuda and Mexico. I received unlimited text and talk, and the data was subtracted from my monthly allowance. I was able to use gps maps and data to navigate a boat we rented in Bermuda. I turned on my Hotspot, and the whole family was able to use their phones to check in with social media.

 

The Travel Pass service is not available on the ship, but you can save longer phone calls for port days.

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Have 3 kids at home. Get the "social internet plan" and use Facebook Messenger. You can even get the kids version of Messenger (tied through your FB account, you setup up which of your friends they can message with, they can't speak with anyone else and no one can see they have it/"friend them) and speak with your kids directly.

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If you have the internet package you can make free calls using the google hangout dialer app.

 

Also, some phones have wifi calling built in. You can call people using wifi calling and you wont be charged roaming fees. Just make sure your phone is in airplane mode before making the call.

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I was just on the the two week repossessioning cruise on the Carnival Breeze and before the cruised I opted for the AT&T unlimited talk and text cruise plan and I also had the premium internet package

 

The WiFi on the ship was just too unreliable. While I was sometimes able to make VOIP calls on both google hangouts and Facebook messenger it was buggy at best and I couldn't rely on it for incoming calls.

 

The AT&T plan in contrast worked really well. All the ports we visited were covered on the plan. The only condition was I had to make at least one call from the ship before any of the islands we visited would be covered(to prevent non cruiseser from abusing this plan I guess). The plan was $100 and covered you for exactly 30 days from when you activate it. It also gave me 2 or 3 gb that data that I didn't really use. There were really only two negatives I experienced. The first was while at sea there was increased delay that sometime lead to two people talking at the same time, but it minor. The other issue was anytime you were leaving or coming into port the cell service on the ship would be turned off so you would have no signal from inside the ship. Even when docked, unless thee was a cell tower right at the port, you still had to go outside to get a signal. While at sea, there was not anywhere on the ship I didn't have coverage. The only other annoyance(small) was I had my phones timezone set to sync to the cell provider. When they first turned on the cellular at sea after we left Galveston my phone switched from central time to GMT so I had to hard set the time zone on the phone.

 

Normally I would not have gotten the phone plan, but it was a 14 days cruise and I was cruising on my own and we had two family emergencies(why my wife stayed behind) just before the cruise and wanted to stay in touch with the family if something bad happened. .

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If you have the internet package you can make free calls using the google hangout dialer app.

 

Also, some phones have wifi calling built in. You can call people using wifi calling and you wont be charged roaming fees. Just make sure your phone is in airplane mode before making the call.

 

 

I have read that the cruise ships don't support wifi calling? I take it this isn't always true?

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Verizon has a Travel Pass add on for international travel which you can use in port. Basically, for a $10/24 hour fee (or only $5 in Mexico), your service is activated under your existing Verizon plan. https://www.verizonwireless.com/solutions-and-services/international-travel/. You sign up for the program on-line. It is only activated when/if you turn off airplane mode in port.

 

We have used it in Bermuda and Mexico. I received unlimited text and talk, and the data was subtracted from my monthly allowance. I was able to use gps maps and data to navigate a boat we rented in Bermuda. I turned on my Hotspot, and the whole family was able to use their phones to check in with social media.

 

The Travel Pass service is not available on the ship, but you can save longer phone calls for port days.

 

This sounds like my best bet! Thank you for the info. I am a version customer

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I have read that the cruise ships don't support wifi calling? I take it this isn't always true?

 

 

 

You need a decent wifi signal to make calling work, which is not available on all Carnival ships. We got messenger to work, but no video.

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About to show my lack of technical knowledge :) I think I need to take Phones and Internet on Board 101

 

You're supposed to keep your phone in Airplane Mode, correct? Can you have Wi-Fi turned on when in airplane mode?

If you purchase the ship's internet plan, do you still access Facebook Messenger from your phone, or do you need to log on from a computer?

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"airplane mode" prevents your phone from trying to connect to cell tower which will rack up charges even if you're not using your phone. WiFi is an alternate way of connecting to a private network and would be used for the Hub app or using WhatsApp or other VOIP (voice over internet protocol). Personally I keep my phone on WiFi only as much as I can whether sailing or not.

About to show my lack of technical knowledge :) I think I need to take Phones and Internet on Board 101

 

You're supposed to keep your phone in Airplane Mode, correct? Can you have Wi-Fi turned on when in airplane mode?

If you purchase the ship's internet plan, do you still access Facebook Messenger from your phone, or do you need to log on from a computer?

 

Sent from my SM-G920T using Tapatalk

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I have read that the cruise ships don't support wifi calling? I take it this isn't always true?

It works. I do it all the time. It actually works fairly well in my experience. Also, wifi calling use very little data/bandwidth so the internet doesnt have to be fast in order for it to work. I was on the Magic and they had terrible internet service and I was able to wifi call anyone.

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We don't have any little ones at home so if we need to call back to the states we use the cabin phone.  Was $1.99 a minute when I last used it.  Easy and reliable.

If you stop in San Juan or St Thomas - for most providers - your phone works just like on the mainland USA because they are US territories. Check with your company to be sure.😀

Also ,,, I leave this info with our adult son and my siblings:
Copied and pasted from the CCL FAQ's :

In the event of a true emergency, family may contact our call center at 
1-800-227-6482 
on a 24/7 basis.

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