Cellphones

alexandersdad

Does anyone have any advice about renting a cellphone in the US to bring to India for a two week trip with my son who is finishing a college semester abroad program? We'll be doing Delhi, Agra, Jaipur, Darjeeling and Gangtok.

capt_mahajan

I don't know about renting but suspect calls from a US phone will be very expensive.

If you are looking for alternatives, a new and cheap Nokia cellphone in India can be purchased for less than 2000 rupees. The SIM card and talktime charges will be extra.

Many airports seem to have a cellphone rental facility. Don't know how it works.

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Cardamom

Hi alexandersdad,

Sounds like a fun trip Who is your carrier here in the US and what model phone do you have? Making a switch to international on an existing line can be a costly option & will most likely have to remain for a year (depending on your carrier). Also, depending on the phone model, it may not even work. To my knowledge, I don't think any of the pre-paid US carriers work internationally.

I agree with the captain - cheapest option is to just get a phone while you're in India. Less hassle and stress


-C

The_Londoner

If prices of international roaming call charges are same as UK, it is not advisable to rent a Mobile phone. It's far too costly. In the UK, you can buy a multi-frequency mobile phone on eBay so cheaply. Take one of those with you and get a number in India. It's cheaper to run, it's cheaper to make calls to US from than rested solution, and it's far far cheaper to receive calls to from than rented solution. Make sure the mobile phone you take to India is 1) unlocked so that it can work with other network, eg in India, 2) works with Indian mobile phone frequency, most recent mobile phones are multi-frequency.

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hmm..whatcanthisbe

alexandersdad

Here are your options

keep your current cell and your provider and use international roaming and get bombarded with roaming charges and minutes when you are in india
2 if you have a GSM connection in the us (ie use a sim card ) and it is a Quad/ TRI band phone(PM ME THE PHONE MODEL) you can unlock it / get it unlocked in delhi or in the us (pretty cheap) and then land in delhi and right at the airport just buy a connection for Rs 100 and get a local delhi number and recharge as you go...
last option
Get to india pick up a new phone for as little at 1200 RS(~30USD) ( motorola & Nokia) get a connection use as you go and voila you are done

PM / e-mail for more info

nayan

I would also suggest get a new phone in india for around 1200 rupees. get a prepaid(pay as you go) connection from airtel/vodaphone. the complete outlay should not be more than 1500 to 1800 rupees.

brownboy66

This is probably the definitive thread on IM for getting up and running with a cell phone in India.

As other's have mentioned - roaming international into India is hugely expensive, and given the number of services/ technologies available its unnecessary to lumber yourself with those sorts of costs. It might be convenient in terms of having something ready to go upon arrival - but the extra cost really doesn't justify it.

As hmm..whatcanthisbe has mentioned - getting a sim card in India (with a local number and local charges) is doable - and fairly common (but not always straight forward). If you are bringing a phone from the US and its GSM - triband will be the least your need - quad band will give you a few more options (GSM in the states uses 850 and 1900 band - while India uses 900 and 1800 band - hence the reason you need triband at the least). And as mentioned - it will need to be unlocked to use a local sim card.

If its cdma - you don't have the same problems. Even if its EVDO or Rev A, it will be backward compatible.

Whether you end up purchasing a sim card or a complete phone with sim card here - as you'll see in the related threads, you are going to need extra passport photos, copies of your passport, copies of your visa as part of the application process.

In anycase - good luck.

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