Cell phone use at WDW

[MegaSilver]

Anyone have any info on BLACKBERRY use??? We're with ROGERS and will need to be able to both call and text. Hubby has own business so will on occasion need to check in

According to the ROAM FAQ, if you are using BB10 then yes. If not, no

 

[Donald - my hero]

According to the ROAM FAQ, if you are using BB10 then yes. If not, no

well then, that could pose a problem. Might need to upgrade my ancient flip-phone before we go

 

[bankr63]

A quick warning to ROAM mobility users. We took a day trip to Watertown this past week while camping in the Thousand Islands area. When I tried to top up my phone using SMS messaging from the US side, I got a message back from ROAM saying that their SMS facility would be down for several weeks, and to please use the website to reload.

Not very helpful when you are already on the road. Tried to reload when we grabbed lunch at Panera using their free Wi-Fi with my phone, but couldn't get the transaction to go through (well, I gave up because everyone else had finished eating and I was still trying to get the transaction done).

So lesson learned: top up before you leave. However, since I get all kinds of other notifications and promotions from ROAM, it would have been nice if they had sent out a warning about this!

 

[stefanospops]

We just got back from two weeks at the world and we both switched to Wind Mobility prior to going down. Specifically, my wife switched and I got a temp number to use the service for a month to try it out. While down there we didn't have many issues other than needing to change settings on the iphone to allow data to work. The coverage was very good in the Orlando area and not bad for the drive from Toronto either. They use T-Mobile and AT&T so reasonable coverage throughout.

If your trip will be less than 19 days then ROAM is the more economical choice. The cost for 19 days is $60.30 and includes just under 6GB of data. With WIND for $60 you get unlimited data and 1000 minutes for the month. If going for just a week ROAM is much better at $27.65 with 2GB of data.

 

[supradupafast]

I switched to WIND a year ago, and have the $30 plan (now $35)
When I go south of the border, I just Add-on the $15/mth USA Unlimited Roaming.

 

[KennedyDCL]

I group of 35 of us just went down to Darien Lake last weekend. About 10 people purchased the Roam mobility SIM cards prior to departing including myself. My DW, who is on Wind, I just upgraded to the $15 Unlimited US Roaming add-on.

A few people had initial hiccups getting the Roam to work but primarily it was caused by those individuals not reading all the instructions provided by Roam. We had created a Whatsapp group for everyone prior to departing and used it the entire length of the trip. Roam worked perfectly for our situation. We were all able to communicate quickly and easily, while doing are cross boarder shopping on the Friday. While at the park people could share pictures of their location or of the activities they were doing, so everyone was aware of what was happening throughout the park.

From a speed perspective, I found my DW's Wind phone was a little better service wise, especially comparing the upload time of photos her's uploaded twice as fast as myself on Roam. However, neither were what I would consider "slow".

We found Staples had the best price for the Roam cards at $14.95 each + taxes. Setup was a breeze and I like that you can pre-book the time you want to start the 1-day, 3-day, 7-day plans. Also, most of us received a credit of $3.95 as well because we all setup our Roam SIM cards in September when they had a deal on. I used the credit, paid the $1 LTE upgrade fee and for $11.50 received unlimited calling, text and 900MB of data for 3 days.

 

[Gina-Gina-Bo-Bina]

I group of 35 of us just went down to Darien Lake last weekend. About 10 people purchased the Roam mobility SIM cards prior to departing including myself. My DW, who is on Wind, I just upgraded to the $15 Unlimited US Roaming add-on.

A few people had initial hiccups getting the Roam to work but primarily it was caused by those individuals not reading all the instructions provided by Roam. We had created a Whatsapp group for everyone prior to departing and used it the entire length of the trip. Roam worked perfectly for our situation. We were all able to communicate quickly and easily, while doing are cross boarder shopping on the Friday. While at the park people could share pictures of their location or of the activities they were doing, so everyone was aware of what was happening throughout the park.

From a speed perspective, I found my DW's Wind phone was a little better service wise, especially comparing the upload time of photos her's uploaded twice as fast as myself on Roam. However, neither were what I would consider "slow".

We found Staples had the best price for the Roam cards at $14.95 each + taxes. Setup was a breeze and I like that you can pre-book the time you want to start the 1-day, 3-day, 7-day plans. Also, most of us received a credit of $3.95 as well because we all setup our Roam SIM cards in September when they had a deal on. I used the credit, paid the $1 LTE upgrade fee and for $11.50 received unlimited calling, text and 900MB of data for 3 days.

We used Roam for the first time on our trip this past August. We loved it. It was so nice having unlimited calling and texting, and we used the free wifi everywhere we went rather than purchasing data. We got so much more value for the money versus the travel add-ons provided by Telus. We would totally recommend Roam!

 

[101Pongo]

Roam Mobility is the way to go!

CAD$3.95/day for unlimited talk, text and data. Only thing is we found the coverage a bit sketchy at WDW but all-in-all it was a good deal. We used the free wifi wherever it connected and data otherwise.

 

[Disney_Alli]

I will first admit I have not read all of this thread but...

Has anyone used Telaway to put a SIM into an unlocked iPhone for their unlimited calls, texts and data? It's $59.97 for 11-30 days (we'll be away for 22 days) plus a $9.99 fee for the SIM itself. It sounds like a great way for my fiancé and I to be able to stay in touch during our honeymoon trip without worrying about dropping the wifi signal.

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[bankr63]

I will first admit I have not read all of this thread but...

Has anyone used Telaway to put a SIM into an unlocked iPhone for their unlimited calls, texts and data? It's $59.97 for 11-30 days (we'll be away for 22 days) plus a $9.99 fee for the SIM itself. It sounds like a great way for my fiancé and I to be able to stay in touch during our honeymoon trip without worrying about dropping the wifi signal.

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

Think this is the first time that Telaway has been mentioned here, but it looks essentially the same as Roam Mobility. Same T-Mobile backbone, same operating premise, a little bit cheaper as Roam would set you back $63 for 22 days.

The one bonus that I see for Telaway is that they also provide you with a local number that you forward your cell to before leaving your service area. This allows you to avoid some LD charges. That is a neat idea. Currently I forward my Rogers number to my FL Roam number before I leave, but those forwarded calls do generate LD charges on my Rogers bill.

Looks like Telaway has been around for quite some time in the rental cell phone market as well, so they have some history. I'd give them a try, you're really only out the cost of the sim card for your trouble.

 

[ccudmore]

Just read up on the Rogers Roam Like Home package.

If you have a Share Everything plan and sign up for Roam Like Home, you simply pay $5/day that you're in the US and get free roaming up to their usage limit at home. This covers talk, text and data. No extra charges, no roaming caps. If you go over your cap, the extra charges are exactly what they would be if you'd gone over at home. The $5 is per device.

If I'm going for 7 days, I'd gladly just pay $35 instead of having to fuss with swapping sim cards and pre-paying.

 

[bankr63]

Would be interested in hearing about others' real-life experiences with Roam Like Home. Any hidden fees charged? Whose network are you roaming on - coverage good in Orlando? I just switched my existing Rogers to the new plan (works out a bit cheaper than what we had for 2 phones), but honestly trust Rogers about as much as I'd trust a hungry tiger in a sheep barn.

Really like ROAM and have used for a few trips South, but Rogers will only be $1 more/day than ROAM and we can keep our Canadian numbers so others can reach us easily. We will be bringing our ROAM Mobility sim cards just in case, and my son will probably still use one in his Nexus phone as he is PAYG in Canada.

 

[cslittle999]

Would be interested in hearing about others' real-life experiences with Roam Like Home. Any hidden fees charged? Whose network are you roaming on - coverage good in Orlando? I just switched my existing Rogers to the new plan (works out a bit cheaper than what we had for 2 phones), but honestly trust Rogers about as much as I'd trust a hungry tiger in a sheep barn. Really like ROAM and have used for a few trips South, but Rogers will only be $1 more/day than ROAM and we can keep our Canadian numbers so others can reach us easily. We will be bringing our ROAM Mobility sim cards just in case, and my son will probably still use one in his Nexus phone as he is PAYG in Canada.

With Rogers you roam on AT&T. AT&T added a number of microcell site around the park back in March. Like you I've been using Roam up till now so I can't give you a report on the quality of the signal.

 

[lilia78]

We use Roam Mobility and it's great! We used it last year in Richmond, Virginia and Columbus, Ohio and this year so far in Minneapolis. We will be using it for 8 days in Florida. Easy to use with our unlocked iPhone 5 & 6.

 

[hardis5]

Think this is the first time that Telaway has been mentioned here, but it looks essentially the same as Roam Mobility. Same T-Mobile backbone, same operating premise, a little bit cheaper as Roam would set you back $63 for 22 days.

The one bonus that I see for Telaway is that they also provide you with a local number that you forward your cell to before leaving your service area. This allows you to avoid some LD charges. That is a neat idea. Currently I forward my Rogers number to my FL Roam number before I leave, but those forwarded calls do generate LD charges on my Rogers bill.

Looks like Telaway has been around for quite some time in the rental cell phone market as well, so they have some history. I'd give them a try, you're really only out the cost of the sim card for your trouble.

A few differences between Roam (I've used numerous times) and Telaway looking at their offerings, Telaway sells a fixed minimum of days (i.e. 10 days) so if I want 5 days you are paying for a minimum of 10. Their prices are in USD (at least on their website) and comparing 10 days, Roam is $39.50 CDN and Telaway is $49.97 USD. Add in the current exchange rate and the price difference grows even more. I have always added to my existing sim with Roam (keeping the same number) but it appears you can only buy the prefixed number of days with Telaway while needing to order a sim each time (which adds $9.97 USD to the cost). The local number may be an advantage, but they only offer numbers for 4 cities (Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Montreal). If a call to one of these cities is long distance for you within Canada, this feature is not worth much.

 

[disneyred]

Roam Mobility is the way to go!

CAD$3.95/day for unlimited talk, text and data. Only thing is we found the coverage a bit sketchy at WDW but all-in-all it was a good deal. We used the free wifi wherever it connected and data otherwise.

I have been reading how great ROAM is .. and would like to try it .. but at some point would it not be cheaper to stay with your own provider depending on the number of days your vacation is and price of roaming package >>. that is , for example, if going for 14 days, ROAM= 3.95x12days=47.40 cost to you.
if you can get a roaming package from your own provider for cheaper.. would you not pick the cheaper one ....

so what I am saying is depending on #days of your vacation .. it would be beneficial to take a roaming package from your provider if your vacation tends be be longer...
what do you think .. any comments ? thx...

 

[hardis5]

Two advantages I see with Roam. All calling back to Canada is free and unlimited (no long distance) within your daily rate. A call of just a few minutes could easily eat into any savings of using your own plan given you exceed the minutes within the roaming package of your own provider. Given data plan with Roam, they provide 400Mb a day (so if having for 14 days, you have 5.6Gb of data available to use (which we do use with tethering for our tablets when not having WiFi available).

 

[RatherDrive]

I have used roam and liked it, but to keep the same number you have to ensure you use it once per year. Now with our provider we have the "roam like home" where we can now use our phone for only $5/day/phone up to a maximum of $50/phone. We get unlimited calling and texting in the US and Canada as well as access to our data plans. For us this is the better way. We still use the Wi-Fi while at Disney since it saves on our data usage.

 

[Queen of Oakville]

I just looked at roam mobility. it seems you have to get a new cell#. is that correct? I just switched from rogers to bell. I think rogers had better travel plans. Looks like I'm in for $20 for the data plan and then $30 for a talk and text plan with bell.

 

[Queen of Oakville]

how good is the wifi at the resorts (cabana bay). If I can switch to wifi at the resorts, I should be good with the smaller of the two data plans.