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How can I buy a T-Mobile prepaid SIM card for my US vacation?

Hi everyone
I bought my SGS 4G during my last US vacation.
Coming back to visit (10 days on August), I'd like to buy a prepaid SIM card with unlimited 3G/4G with a local line just for this stay.
I saw s SIM card for 50$ in the T-Mobile site.
How can I do that, if I'm not at the states at the moment?
What alternatives do I have?
I searched the web and couldn't find a clear, easy & cheap solution.
It has to work with my lovely SGS 4G.
Thanks in advance!
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA

itzik
Your best bet is most likely gonna be to just get the plan once you arrive in the states. Tmob stores are all over the place so unless your flying into Podunk, Kentucky(no offense to people from the great state of Kentucky) you should be able to find a store within a few miles of the airport. Hope you figure it out and you have a blast in the States.

Just out of curiosity where will you be? Here in NYC t-mobile stores are everywhere & may be in the airport itself.
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Hi guys
Last year in NYC 2 different AT&T stores didn't want to sell me a SIM card as I'm a tourist with no social security number. This year my starting point is Miami.
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA

I would contact a store close to where you will be staying in Miami. Tell them whats going on and they will probably be more than happy to help you. Also Walmart sells T-mo stuff so they might be able to help you. IIRC you can save a tiny bit buying from walmart.
Another option is use the Straight Talk sim card program. Its five bucks cheaper and the same service. Im not totally sure of the data connection. Im looking into the type of data connection you get. I know Normal straight talk phones have the same coverage as att,verizon and t-mo. Ill update once I can get a straight answer.

Great, 10x, I'll make some research on the mobile stores around my staying area i.e south beach.
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It would be best to wait until you're in the states. You will have no problem getting a prepaid SIM activated from T-Mobile (I am an Event Rep for them). I'm not sure if they offer it in Florida but if you don't really need many minutesthey offer unlimited 4g (throttled after 5gb) & messaging with 100 minutes for $30. I sell a lot of that plan during conventions here in Denver.
Sent from my SGH-T959V using xda premium

Talked to a Straight talk rep the byod sims operate 3g service. So if the T-Mo $30 plan doesnt have enough minutes for ya that is a option.

Hi eb13
That plan sounds like just what I need. Is it limited to a period of time? I found a T-mo store in Miami but it has low ratings.. and probably they won't offer this plan. I'll try contacting them on Monday.
Thanks.
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itzik2sh said:
Hi eb13
That plan sounds like just what I need. Is it limited to a period of time? I found a T-mo store in Miami but it has low ratings.. and probably they won't offer this plan. I'll try contacting them on Monday.
Thanks.
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The t-mo 30 dollar plan is good for 30 days.
This from the t-mo site.
*First 5GB at up to 4G speeds. New activations only. Available exclusively in-store at Walmart, on Walmart.com, and T-Mobile.com.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would goto walmart and get it. Normally they are slightly cheaper.

eollie said:
The t-mo 30 dollar plan is good for 30 days.
This from the t-mo site.
I would goto walmart and get it. Normally they are slightly cheaper.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1 Walmart and online arethe only points of sale for the $30 plan
Source: used to work cell phones in Walmart, then wireless advocates (staples/Costco) and TMobile
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA

Hi Again
OK, so regarding the T-mobile 30$ plan I found this on T-mo site :
http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/monthly-4g-plans
and this one on Wallmart site :
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Tmobile-30-Wireless-Airtime-Card/15443357?findingMethod=rr#ProductDetail
Few things still unclear to me :
1. If I buy it from T-mo, do I have to do it in advance and ask for delivery to the hotel or can I just instantly go and buy it from a local T-mo store I found 15 minutes walk from the Hotel ?
maybe I should order it online and just go pick it up from that store ?
2. Why do all stores in Miami get lousy reviews with "bad customer service", "no parking" and "no one speaks English there" ?
3. Wallmart centers are not near my staying place, so I could order it and get it shipped to the hotel I suppose, but here it says :
"The $30 Unlimited Web & Text with 100 min talk plan works only with T-Mobile Phones purchased from a Walmart store or from Walmart.com"
WTF ? I bought my phone in some local Manhattan store I don't even remember its name.
4. Even in Wallmart site I see I get the activation code via mail - but how would they know my IMEI number?
Regarding the Straight-Talk plans I found this one :
http://www.straighttalksim.com/shop.php
So what I understand from this is that it will cost me 60$ overall (which is twice the T-mo price).
I don't really need the unlimited talk, but mabe it's worth the price comparing to T-mobile service.
What do you advise ?
Thanks !!!

The $30 plan is suppose to be part of the byod(bring your own device) promotion so walmart should be willing to sell you the sim card. I would goto my local walmart and ask but I know each store will do things slightly different.
You also might be able to contact t-mobile and tell them what your wanting to do and ask what they suggest. They might be able to have the item shipped to the hotel in advance of your arrival and you pick it up at the desk when you sign in. What you are getting from them is the sim card it costs like 4 bucks and they refund that to you once you activate.
If you dont need the unlimited calling then I would stick to t-mo. In Miami area the 4g service should be super.

itzik2sh said:
Hi Again
OK, so regarding the T-mobile 30$ plan I found this on T-mo site :
http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/monthly-4g-plans
and this one on Wallmart site :
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Tmobile-30-Wireless-Airtime-Card/15443357?findingMethod=rr#ProductDetail
Few things still unclear to me :
1. If I buy it from T-mo, do I have to do it in advance and ask for delivery to the hotel or can I just instantly go and buy it from a local T-mo store I found 15 minutes walk from the Hotel ?
maybe I should order it online and just go pick it up from that store ?
2. Why do all stores in Miami get lousy reviews with "bad customer service", "no parking" and "no one speaks English there" ?
3. Wallmart centers are not near my staying place, so I could order it and get it shipped to the hotel I suppose, but here it says :
"The $30 Unlimited Web & Text with 100 min talk plan works only with T-Mobile Phones purchased from a Walmart store or from Walmart.com"
WTF ? I bought my phone in some local Manhattan store I don't even remember its name.
4. Even in Wallmart site I see I get the activation code via mail - but how would they know my IMEI number?
Regarding the Straight-Talk plans I found this one :
http://www.straighttalksim.com/shop.php
So what I understand from this is that it will cost me 60$ overall (which is twice the T-mo price).
I don't really need the unlimited talk, but mabe it's worth the price comparing to T-mobile service.
What do you advise ?
Thanks !!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1. No you do not need to buy in advance. You can walk into any Tmo store and buy prepaid activation on site. Choose to activate yourself by phone and the $30 option is available to anyone who activate by phone.
2. Because people are jerks
3. disregard that, I sell these plans to people on a daily basis at numerous locations and in any phone. I have activated these for customers with unlocked iphones (not proud of that).
4. You provide your IMEI when activating buy it's only to make sure you're not going to use a phone that's been reported stolen from retail. (if a phone is stolen from a retail location the IMEI guess into a database)
I highly advise staying away from Straight Talk - just my opinion but there service on every level is less than respectable.
Sent from my SGH-T959V using xda premium

Hi guys
Thanks for all the replies!
I'm probably taking the 30$ unlimited web plan and Skype pay as you go credit for the long distance. I think it's ideal for a 10 days period.
Sent from my SGH-T959V using XDA

Hi everyone,
Excuse me for bringing back this topic, but I have a similar question regarding this topic. We're visiting California next week as an European tourist. I'm willing to buy the 30 days unlimited web prepaid deal from t mobile, however I saw that it is for 'US residents only'.
Do they check this? Do you have to provide a passport or something?
We only need Internet for 3 weeks so 30 days is sufficient, it's mainly for navigation purpose on my HTC Sensation.
Another question, is the sim a standard one or is it a micro sim?
Hope you can give us the answer! Can't wait for our visit!
Best regards,
Jasper from the Netherlands.

Dutchman86 said:
Hi everyone,
Excuse me for bringing back this topic, but I have a similar question regarding this topic. We're visiting California next week as an European tourist. I'm willing to buy the 30 days unlimited web prepaid deal from t mobile, however I saw that it is for 'US residents only'.
Do they check this? Do you have to provide a passport or something?
We only need Internet for 3 weeks so 30 days is sufficient, it's mainly for navigation purpose on my HTC Sensation.
Another question, is the sim a standard one or is it a micro sim?
Hope you can give us the answer! Can't wait for our visit!
Best regards,
Jasper from the Netherlands.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No they do not check it. You do not need to provide a passport. However you may be required to present an ID. It varies. If you plan to get one at a T-Mobile store, you can request a standard one, or microsim. If for some reason you decide to buy it online, it'll come as a standard similar card.
Sent from my SGH-T959V using xda premium

[Q] Going to Europe, best plan for calling texting?

On AT&T going to Ireland then England. Any tricks other than paying att their ridiculous price to have calling/texting while I'm there? Maybe through Google voice? Or does that need data?
Thanks!
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using xda premium

If you're gonna be strictly communicating with people back in the states, then the smart thing is to stay with Google voice via PC. However, if you plan on communicating with people in Europe for an extended period of time, then unlock your phone and go with an EU Virgin Mobile prepaid plan.
I forget how my minutes/texting plan looked like but it was ideal, only 30 Euros per month prepaid, and I was able to pickup service and call all throughout Europe.

Will be contacting with friends and traveling family in europe, and with friends and family back in the states. Last time I went I unlocked my old blackberry and went with a prepaid sim, but I don't feel like it really saved me much money. If people call and text my gvoice number while I'm in Europe, is that free? Do I just have to worry about the local stuff then?
It's two of us that are going so really trying to save where I can.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using xda premium

my cousin went to portugal last summer and used handcent sms to text all of us back in the states for free, and used his gvoice account to make calls also for free

mjwhirly said:
my cousin went to portugal last summer and used handcent sms to text all of us back in the states for free, and used his gvoice account to make calls also for free
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Handcent needs data I'm sure which costs a lot more. As for calling AT&T wants 99c a minute. Calling put with Google voice still uses minutes I'm almost certain. So how does that work.
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Giffgaff
I'd recommend going with Giffgaff:
h**p://giffgaff.com/goodybags/10pound-facebook-goodybag
For 10 pounds/month you get 250 minutes, unlimited texting, and unlimited data. The APN settings are easily found on their website. All prepaid, no contracts. Runs on the O2 network, which is considered [from what I've read] the best in the UK.
Then I would download WhatsApp! from the market and have all your friends do the same. You give them your new Giffgaff number, and you can message all your friends back home for free using the data connection. You could also use google voice for this purpose.
I wish we had options like this in the US. I had an equally inexpensive provider in Germany. Worked great!

Best plan, "borrow" someone else's phone
Sent from Down The Rabbit Hole, using Tapatalk 2.

That looks epic! Will have to unlock my phone first though. Hope they are legitimate I have no idea how they afford those rates.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using xda premium

I'm sure they're legit.
If you're worried, Tesco (the grocery store chain) also offers a cheap prepaid SIM with roughly the same benefits, for the same price.
Both services use the O2 network, and I know a couple different people that use Tesco, and say it works great.
h**p://shop.tescomobile.com/sim-only
In all honesty, from having used many prepaid providers in many european countries, once you find a provider that works, you're pretty much just shopping around for who has the best refill options. Giffgaff looks like you can top up with a credit card. Tesco might require you to go buy a top-up card at the store. I'm not entirely sure.

Google Voice App question

I set it up and everything is fine on my HTC EVO 4G I just had a question about the services. I know I can call and text anyone in the US or Canada totally free however! My question as an American becomes does the Canadian person get the call as local or long distance?
Like if I called the US it'd be free to me and obviously local to the other American, if I called Canada it's still free to me but my problem becomes "what about their bill?"

Here in Europe it's working this way: You would pay the rate for reaching the canadian boarder (so you pay national fees only) and the person you called pays his/her national fees only, too. Now i'm rather unsure how it's working in the USA, but i guess it should be the same :O

price rance
m00k00 said:
Here in Europe it's working this way: You would pay the rate for reaching the canadian boarder (so you pay national fees only) and the person you called pays his/her national fees only, too. Now i'm rather unsure how it's working in the USA, but i guess it should be the same :O
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
for US to US calling its completely free landlines cell phones
everything
it should have the same rates as if you had installed the Voice chat plugin (phone add in) on your gmail on PC??
i take it google voice is simply a mobile version of that???

call billing on the receiver never varies based on the origin of the call (unless it's a toll call, but you have to accept that charge ahead of time).
As the person receiving the call, you never have to worry about picking up a ringing phone aside from it using minutes/megabytes/etc. Think about the days before callerID, how could you predict who was calling? That's just not the way phone termination works.

NV-3D said:
for US to US calling its completely free landlines cell phones
everything
it should have the same rates as if you had installed the Voice chat plugin (phone add in) on your gmail on PC??
i take it google voice is simply a mobile version of that???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks a lot helped me for sure

Solavei - Cool new service provider that pays you money!

Stop paying ridiculous amounts of money for your cell phone bill ! Solavei is the most unique and amazing wireless phone service provider out there. How would you like to pay only $49/month for service with unlimited minutes, texting, and data(4G limited to 4gb, which is fine for someone like me who can't hardly use 2gb in one month:silly ??
But it gets better.... When you sign up your friends & family, Solavei will pay you money every month that they stay with the service as well as a few other options to earn yourself some extra cash for doing almost nothing but spreading the word about Solavei.
There is a deal going right now when you sign up before December 31st, you get the first month of service for free. Go check it out you won't regret it.
www.solavei.com

Why are you spamming our forum for your gain???
This isn't something we come here for.
Please stop
Sent from my HTC MyTouch 4G Slide using xda premium

noevoman said:
Why are you spamming our forum for your gain???
This isn't something we come here for.
Please stop
Sent from my HTC MyTouch 4G Slide using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry that you think I am spamming the forum. If weren't interested you wouldn't have come to my thread in the first place. I own a Mytouch 4g slide, so I thought it appropriate to share [in General] with fellow users of the same phone a great new opportunity. If I was "spamming" the forum there would be more than just one thread on the topic. I don't come to XDA to see other user's noob question threads that have already been answered in the stickies, but I don't complain about it.
If you have a question or a comment that is on topic that would be appreciated. thanks

GravvyTrain said:
Stop paying ridiculous amounts of money for your cell phone bill ! ******* is the most unique and amazing wireless phone service provider out there. How would you like to pay only $49/month for service with unlimited minutes, texting, and data(4G limited to 4gb, which is fine for someone like me who can't hardly use 2gb in one month:silly ??
But it gets better.... When you sign up your friends & family, ******** will pay you money every month that they stay with the service as well as a few other options to earn yourself some extra cash for doing almost nothing but spreading the word about ********.
There is a deal going right now when you sign up before December 31st, you get the first month of service for free. Go check it out you won't regret it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I pay less for everything included and unlimited. with all the things (4G data, voicemail, texting, call display, call fwd, 3-way-calling, free long distance within either Canada or whole North America and whatever else is there, I don't even remember what else I have) and that's in Canadian Dollars, LOL
Why the f. would I want to pay more for a lesser and so restricted/limited service?
Someobody pls delete this thread. Obviously it is advertising crap/spam.

MT4GS said:
I pay less for everything included and unlimited. with all the things (4G data, voicemail, texting, call display, call fwd, 3-way-calling, free long distance within either Canada or whole North America and whatever else is there, I don't even remember what else I have) and that's in Canadian Dollars, LOL
Why the f. would I want to pay more for a lesser and so restricted/limited service?
Someobody pls delete this thread. Obviously it is advertising crap/spam.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is not so restricted/limited as you say. And if you think there is any provider that ACTUALLY gives you unlimited data then you have obviously not read your own contract agreement.
But you missed a whole point of my post. The company will pay you money past the point where it cancels out your phone bill (free service). I don't know what is so hard to understand about this concept. I am just here discussing a service I have recently switched over to, and everyone wants to call it spam... good grief..........................

GravvyTrain said:
It is not so restricted/limited as you say. And if you think there is any provider that ACTUALLY gives you unlimited data then you have obviously not read your own contract agreement.
But you missed a whole point of my post. The company will pay you money past the point where it cancels out your phone bill (free service). I don't know what is so hard to understand about this concept. I am just here discussing a service I have recently switched over to, and everyone wants to call it spam... good grief..........................
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your intentions are good, but this deal is not.
Essentially it's like all those different offers where they say get a PS3 or Wii, or gift card to any store you want for free!
All you have to do is sign up for 5 offers, complete them and get 5 friends to do the same. Essentially they are using a referral program to get more customers and they're using you for all the legwork. Not exactly a contract, but not exactly a no strings attached deal either.
I bet if anyone decides to cancel, referral person's bonus goes away. And all the people who just signed up have to find their own referrals to get the same bonus as the first guy. Think of it like a pyramid, with your forum thread being the very tip.
You're expanding their business for them and trying to find them all these new customers for $50/trio of people? I say THEY got a good deal.
I've seen many regional carriers offer similar deals. This is nothing out of the ordinary. Check out cricket, boost mobile, and virgin mobile if you don't believe me. Metro PCS too

[Q] I want to save $ monthly

Hi. I don't know if this is the right place on this forum for my question or not, but here it goes...
I want to try to save some money MONTHLY and get better/quicker service that I have now with T-Mobile.
My one phone is UNLOCKED already (Samsung Galaxy S3 is me, and HTC Shadow is mom), but I AM LOOKING FOR A MOST SIMPLE REGULAR GSM BAR PHONE (Only NEW and UNLOCKED) for my mom. She doesn't use the phone other than to call (a mom, what can I say...lol).
I'm not happy at all with my monthly cost for the quality of the service I get. I have service 1/4 of the times. I want to switch..
I'm not under any contracts or anything. I'm free as a bird. LoL.
What can you guys suggest for me?? Thanx

wanna save money join Solavei $49 a month, first month free, 4G, unlimited talk text and data. If you join now. If you get people to join you can get the service for free. check it out.

jmh033089 said:
wanna save money join Solavei $49 a month, first month free, 4G, unlimited talk text and data. If you join now. If you get people to join you can get the service for free. check it out.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But, I never heard of this provider... How fast and reliable is the connection?? Thanx

They have been out for over an year, I use them and don't have any issues, there towers are through T-moblie. But you can end up getting paid to do this!

jmh033089 said:
They have been out for over an year, I use them and don't have any issues, there towers are through T-moblie. But you can end up getting paid to do this!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't think this what I want. REALLY.
But very thank you for the tip!!