texting to and from USA

[jubileegirl]

As we're coming to WDW in July and leaving our 2 oldest kids at home, I would really love to be able to text them so I can check up - oops, sorry, I mean 'share' magical moments - with them! We all have an orange pay as you go , which I gather can't be used in the USA. My husband has a BT cellnet pay as you go at work which he could borrow. Can anyone advise what would be our cheapest option if we wanted to have 'text access' to and from the USA ? I expect this to involve buying some new phones so anicipate expense!
Thanks in advance for any suggestions - I know phoning our landline would be the best option but when nobody answers I get very twitchy so texting their mobiles is the shortest cut to my sanity!

 

[rob@rar.org.uk]

O2 (which is what BT Cellnet is now called) charge 49p per text for PAYG customers. Cheapest texts are 25p each with O2 or Virgin monthly contract phones.

Regards

Rob

 

[jubileegirl]

Thanks Rob!
So does this mean we could take my husband's work phone (BT Cellnet which is now O2!) and text 'pay as you go' Orange phones in the UK successfully, albeit expensively!? And can those Orange pay as you go phones text us back even though they're not Triband? Sorry to be a dope - only just got into this mobile phone thing!
Thanks for your help,

Alison

 

[AlanUK]

The O2 PAYG phones you are thinking of taking with you would have to be Tri-Band in order to make and recieve Texts or calls. It doesn't matter about the Orange phones that will be being used in the UK.

When I was at WDW in October the american networks were having problems with SMS and I found I was only able to send messages for 2 or 3 days out of the 18 we were there

Hopefully they have improved this now.

 

[rob@rar.org.uk]

I'll echo what Alan has said about the reliability of sending and receiving texts while abroad. I've also found it to be a bit unreliable, with most messages taking quite a long time to reach their recipient, and some messages not arriving at all.

Regards

Rob