Phone settings for international travel and cruise

[Anonymous]

We haven’t traveled internationally since before the pandemic. I know you are supposed to set your phone to…something, but I can’t remember what. We also seem to still have Verizon travel pass.

Can someone lead me through this like I am 5 years old?

We leave DC and fly to Canada. We put our phone on airplane mode before take-off. What settings do we do regarding cellular and roaming in Canada?

Then we get on a cruise ship and go through international waters, I guess, and use wifi on the ship. What do we set the phone to?

We get off the ship three times in Alaska. Normal US settings for our phone like we were in DC?

Back on the ship and then back in Canada for a few days. Phone settings?

Thanks for any guidance you can provide.

[Anonymous]

If you have an iPhone and don't want to be charged, go into settings, then cellular. From there, you'll see cellular data with a slide button. You can turn that off. Alternatively, if your cell carrier works there, you can turn off data roaming (the next level down).

[Anonymous]

Shut off cellular data, put it on airplane mode.

I shut off nearly all apps as well.

[Anonymous]

I'm not clear if you want to use your phone in Canada or not. If you do want to use the Verizon travel pass, regular settings in Canada will work automatically. If not, shut off cellular/mobile data as pp said.

Alaska is US. No need to do anything.

[Anonymous]

For Verizon Travel Pass in Canada, it is $5 per day per phone.

If you don't want to be charged a travel pass day then keep your phone in airplane mode.

The easy answer is: Do nothing to your phone and Verizon will charge you additional $5 per day per phone while in Canada.

[Anonymous]

We get a pop up text basically as soon as we turn on our phone in a foreign country, saying that we can get the international plan for $10/day. We just always do that, at least for port days, since we want to be able to use our phones.

Different cruise lines have different rules about wifi and texting on board. There's usually a wifi charge that is not cheap, and you get a set number of minutes. Your kids may burn through that FAST if you don't restrict them. Because you will be close to land in the Alaska cruise, you may be able to just get regular cellular on the ship, so you might be able to just do that. Cruisecritic forums can probably answer that for you. Each cruise line now has an app that you can use on the ship, most of which give you a texting capability within the app. I have found those texting apps to be very glitchy -- the texts don't always get delivered in a timely manner. Some cruise lines charge for them or some are free. The cruisecritic forum for your cruise line can give you more information about this (or just google on-board texting app and the cruise line name).

[Anonymous]

Thanks, everybody.

To answer some questions, yes, we are fine with paying Travel Pass to use our phone in Canada. I wasn’t sure if there is any difference there between being on the wifi in the Canadian hotel vs walking around sightseeing on cellular, but it sounds like we just leave our phones like normal.

And we each have wifi on the ship that came as part of a package we bought. It probably isn’t the best, and I’m not sure about limits, but I will go back and try to find those answers.

Thanks.

[Anonymous]

Many people put their phones in airplane mode while abroad, relying on local wi-fi when available to check mail and texts. Your battery will last longer, because you're not searching to c ell signals, and you won''t be charged a roaming fee by your provider. The downside is having no connectivity when you're not within range of public wi-fi in your hotel, a restaurant, transit hub, or elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Many people put their phones in airplane mode while abroad, relying on local wi-fi when available to check mail and texts. Your battery will last longer, because you're not searching to c ell signals, and you won''t be charged a roaming fee by your provider. The downside is having no connectivity when you're not within range of public wi-fi in your hotel, a restaurant, transit hub, or elsewhere.

The other downside is you're connecting to unprotected public networks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We haven’t traveled internationally since before the pandemic. I know you are supposed to set your phone to…something, but I can’t remember what. We also seem to still have Verizon travel pass.

Can someone lead me through this like I am 5 years old?

We leave DC and fly to Canada. We put our phone on airplane mode before take-off. What settings do we do regarding cellular and roaming in Canada?

Then we get on a cruise ship and go through international waters, I guess, and use wifi on the ship. What do we set the phone to?

We get off the ship three times in Alaska. Normal US settings for our phone like we were in DC?

Back on the ship and then back in Canada for a few days. Phone settings?

Thanks for any guidance you can provide.

I have an iphone and use verizon. I just got a text saying there is a free international phone plan offered from June 20-Sept 20, 2024.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We haven’t traveled internationally since before the pandemic. I know you are supposed to set your phone to…something, but I can’t remember what. We also seem to still have Verizon travel pass.

Can someone lead me through this like I am 5 years old?

We leave DC and fly to Canada. We put our phone on airplane mode before take-off. What settings do we do regarding cellular and roaming in Canada?

Then we get on a cruise ship and go through international waters, I guess, and use wifi on the ship. What do we set the phone to?

We get off the ship three times in Alaska. Normal US settings for our phone like we were in DC?

Back on the ship and then back in Canada for a few days. Phone settings?

Thanks for any guidance you can provide.

I have an iphone and use verizon. I just got a text saying there is a free international phone plan offered from June 20-Sept 20, 2024.

Good to know, but most of our trip is before that starts.

[Anonymous]

If you don’t want to use your data or you don’t have a roaming plan added, and you want to connect to free wifi networks, then make sure you have
*unclicked*
- use data while roaming
- use data on mobile plan

And have
*clicked*
- wifi

And remember to *unclick* airplane mode when you get off the flight.