Originally Posted by
Tiki
I have been using TextNow for the last 2 years to be able to get text codes from my banks in the USA. I'm a US citizen who lives in Australia. I use WhatsApp for 99% of phone and texting and I have a local Australian SIM card since I live here. TextNow shut me down for using the service overseas. All I need is some kind of app-based US telephone service that allows those short text codes banks send to verify you.
I'm in almost the same situation as you (ex-US resident who's now in Australia). I use US Mobile, specifically their (no longer available) $5/month plan. This gives 500 minutes, 500 sms, 500MB per month, but most importantly it does NOT support roaming, but DOES support Wifi calling. So whenever I'm in Australia it'll work by using either my wifi connection, or my piggy-backing data over my local Australian SIM card (what's called Backup calling on Pixels). No issues with using the service overseas - it doesn't support roaming, so won't even connect to a non-US mobile network directly!
This worked perfectly for me for both SMS (including banks/etc) and voice calls, both in and out. The only catch is that they no longer offer this plan, and the equivalent one is now $10/month although it does include more minutes/data. There's a few other providers that have similar plans for $5 (eg, Hello Mobile) although I can't specifically recommend any of them.
It used to be possible to pay for additional data for a month for times when I am visiting the US, although they seem to have recently removed this from my grandfathered $5 plan - although it's still possible on the new $10 equivalent.