Phone question

[Patty]

For those of you who have Verizon service, what do you do for a phone while on St. John?

[Coconuts]

My work cell phone uses Verizon, and I'am almost certain that service has gotten better over the last few years. From Gifft Hill at least, it nearly always works now. Down in Cruz Bay, service is very good; I haven't tried it out towards Coral Bay. I shut it off for the North Shore. There are likely to be roaming charges, so using it for other than basic communication can run up the bill. Our villa land lines have the free unlimited dialing plan, which means I don't use the cell phone as much as I might. ATT GoPhones are one option that seems pretty popular.

On the other hand, other than having Verizon service, my qualifications for advice here are thin. I have resisted getting a smart phone; I'm not sure that 24/7 email and web is a good thing. But I compensate in other ways. Yesterday, flying back from a friend's daughter's wedding in Illinois, I taped my boarding pass barcode to the inside of my flip phone, and proudly used it to go "boop" as I checked in. The stewardess at the gate burst out laughing.

All the best,

Kevin

[Barney&barbara]

I have Verizon and all I use it for is texting, calls are on the expensive side but texting is free . Someone mentioned you can call Verizon and ask for a international plan, I don't know if that works but if you need to make calls I would call Verizon customer service

[Boxer5]

I have Verizon too and last year I was close to the BVI and got a roaming charge even though I didn't make a call. Just turned on the phone. This year I am switching to AT&T after having Verizon for all the years I have had cell phone service. AT&T is the best carrier on St. John.

[loria]

i had verizon.... if you are in coral bay it basically stinks. I switched to ATT and while it still stinks out by where we are (near miss lucys) -- we have an MCELL that works really well. surprisingly i was able to get 4g att at salt pond..... that was the first time that ever happened (and one day even had service at Lameshur....

[Teresa_Rae]

One option is to buy a cheapie AT&T GoPhone with prepaid minutes and just use it while you're on STJ.

[GraysonDave]

I turn off data roaming.

Joe's Rum Hut and Sun Dog Cafe have free wifi while you're in town.

I did have a ATT go phone one trip. With as few calls as I really needed to make while out and about, the go phone probably cost me more money than the $1.99/minute that Verizon will charge.

When you can find wifi, you can use skype to make a call.

[KAY]

After going back and forth with Verizon Customer Service for years and a $600 phone bill for BVI roaming charges, we use an ATT to go phone for phone calls and texts. Plan is $2 a day if you use the phone. We use our Verizon at the villa if it has wifi.

[iheartsj]

We have always used ATT. On our first few visits to the island we got quite a few BVI international roaming charges. On return home, I called ATT and explained that we were in the US the whole time and did not travel to the BVI.

ATT deleted the charges. We now have international roaming turned off. If we want it on we just call ATT and they will turn it on and off at your request.

[awardb]

As a long time Verizon user/owner, we have a cheap ATT GoPhone that I bought 3 years ago. Every year before we leave for STJ, I buy an AT&T GoPhone refill card on eBay and load some minutes. Costs very little. Works over most of the island. $2 per day for unlimited calls.