“Sprint plans to sell the iPhone 4S with its micro-SIM slot unlocked; Verizon’s will be initially locked, but if you’ve been a customer in good standing for 60 days, you can call Verizon and ask for an ‘international unlock,'” Jason Snell reports for Macworld.com. “A Verizon spokesperson told me that this is Verizon’s standard policy for all world phones—it’s just the first time it’s manifested itself on an iPhone.”
Snell reports, “So if you’re a Sprint or Verizon iPhone 4S customer traveling internationally, you can buy a pre-paid micro-SIM card with dramatically cheaper rates for data and voice calling, rather than pay for international roaming offered by U.S. carriers to their existing customers. (The only downside is that when you’re using some other carrier’s micro-SIM card, you’ll be using a local phone number rather than your own U.S. phone number–so you won’t be able to receive calls unless you tell people to call the international phone number associated with your card.)”
Read more in the full article here.
[Attribution: Cult of Mac. Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Arline M.” for the heads up.]
This is probably the greatest possible solution for all of us who travel abroad often. No matter what is the reason for my travel, I will always try and get a local SIM card. Otherwise, my phone is of very little utility while I’m there. I simply can’t expect anyone to call New York, just so that they can notify me that they’re running late for our lunch appointment at a restaurant.
As for someone calling me from US while I’m abroad, I can always configure my US number to send me an e-mail (or an international text to my foreign SIM) when an incoming call or voicemail arrives. Google Voice does this fairly well.
A nice thing from Sprint and Verizon. You stay with them for two years contract term, then you have a unlock world phone. As contrast, AT&T will lock you forever to into its dungeon. Go, bolt from AT&T, go with VZ and S.
According to Ars Technica, Sprint has said Snell is wrong, and they will not come unlocked:
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2011/10/sprint-wont-sell-iphone-4s-with-unlocked-micro-sim-card-slot.ars
So which way is it? Anybody know?
If I pay full price for the phone do I still need to buy the data plan?
The problem is that only AT&T allows simultaneous voice and data and AT&T’s data speed promises to be a lot faster. Plus I have a grandfathered unlimited data plan. (Sprint also offers unlimited data.) But maybe having more competition will force AT&T and Verizon to add back unlimited data and force AT&T to add unlocking. Right now I end up shutting my phone off while I travel abroad. A working iPhone with data would be a great help in traveling, but AT&T’s roaming data plans are for the wealthy only.