LtKernelPanic

Thanks for the quick reply. That looks fantastic for future international trips and will simplify thing a lot. Last time I was in the UK I got a sim from 3 with 12 or 15GB of data from Amazon before I left for like 25USD that worked great while in the UK, France and Portugal.

crackjack

Just remember to select the right outgoing number… I’ve seen >$100 bills for 1 call before because people forgot they were using their phone line rather than Whatsapp / GVoice / etc.

Might be an app for that , but I have no idea.

LordHamster

I did exactly that in Jan 2020 when I went to India for a trip.

At the time I had Verizon as my primary voice number on an eSim, and Google FI on physical sim... both in my iPhone (XS I think at the time).

• I made sure to enable Verizon's International day pass just in case something went wrong so I didn't end up with a $6 million dollar phone bill.
• I made sure Verizon wifi calling was enabled.
• I disabled data roaming on the Verizon line
• I set the Verizon line to be the "Voice/SMS" line in the iPhone settings
• I set Google FI to be the "data" line.

Upon arriving in India, my phone showed both lines in the status bar, and next to the Verizon line it said "using cellular data from Google FI" or some such message. I was able to use my phone as at home... making and receiving calls from my Verizon number as well as sending SMS... it all routed via "wifi calling" over the data line of Google FI.

I came home after 1.5 weeks and confirmed my Verizon day passes had never activated during the entire trip.

anrkitec

Stopped by my local AT&T store today [corporate, not a reseller] and good news [sarcasm] - I am eligible for this $1000 13 Pro 256 promotion!

Here's how the exchange went:

Me: I just got a promo offer in my ATT app about you giving me $1000 in trade-in for my 12 Pro 256 on a new 13 Pro 256 for just $2-3/month. Is this for real, does it apply to me, what's the catch?

Them: Yup, the promo is real and you do qualify.

Me: OK, if this is real I'm inclined to do this right here and now but it sounds too good to be true - what's the catch?

Them: No catch - per se.

Me: OK, so what's the catch?

Them: Here's how it works - the 13 Pro 256 is $1100. We give you $1000 for your 12 Pro 256. You agree to pay the $100 difference in equal payments over the next 36 months, or $2.77 a month.

Me: That's it?

Them: Well, not exactly. You have to first pay off the full, unsubsidized price for your 12 Pro.

Me: Full "unsubsidized" price huh? OK, so how does that work?

Them: Well, the full price for your 12 Pro 256 was $1100. You agreed to give us your old iPhone 8 128 in trade, for which we gave you $850 against that $1100, and you also agreed to pay the $250 difference spread out over the next 30 months, or an additional $8.33 per month. To get this new 13 Pro deal you have to first pay off the unsubsidized price of your 12 Pro. As your 12 Pro was $1100, and your old iPhone 8 was only worth $200 at the time, that would mean that you would owe us $1100 - $200 - $100 [12 payments of $8.33 made so far] for a balance of $800 - plus tax of course.

Me: So in other words, this offer you sent me isn't so much a discount promotion as it is an offer to allow me out of the remaining 18 months on my old 30-month 12 Pro promotion by paying the full price of my 12 Pro and the full price of the new 13 Pro 256 [minus the $1000 trade-in] if I agree to stay with AT&T for the next 36 months and pay you $2.75/month for that privilege?

Them: Well - yeah.

*****

I get it. I agreed to a 30-month promotion with specific terms and conditions and AT&T has no obligation to cut me a deal on a newer phone. But they did send out this offer and I wonder how many people will actually take them up on it just to have a one year newer phone.

TGarza

When you signed up for the iPhone 12 promotion, you opted out of the early trade in program which costs $5 more per month per line. I have one line on the program. I am in the process of trading the 12 for a 13.

gfunkdave

I threw caution to the wind yesterday and upgraded my XS to a 13 in blue. There's no real compelling reason to have done so but I like getting a new phone every 3 years and it was time. With the Verizon carrier financing and trade in it cost me $40 in the store and $4/month for the next 24 months.

I also had to upgrade my "unlimited" plan to a more "unlimited" plan for an additional $10/month but the new plan includes personal hotspot (which is handy from time to time) and Disney+, which we will use.

I did a speed test with the new "5G Ultrawideband" and got about 450 Mbps down, which seems just a little faster than LTE on my old phone.

javabytes

You do have to pay off your old phone, but the math seems off here. Your 12 cost $1,100 and you’re on a 30 month installment plan. That’s $36.67/mo. They offered you $850 in credits which are applied monthly as well… $28.33/mo. You are paying out of pocket $8.33/mo, but your phone is being paid off at a rate of $36.67/mo when factoring in the credits. After 12 months that should be $440. So your phone should currently have a payoff amount of $1,100 - $440 = $640.

anrkitec

My back-of-the-napkin math may very well be off and the payoff may very well be closer to $650 than $800, but I pretty much stopped listening when she told me that to get a 13 Pro was going to cost me my phone plus more than five bills plus taxes upfront.

Although, had the 13 Pro incorporated some form of Touch ID I probably would have gone for it anyway. I hate Face ID with the white-hot passion of a thousand suns.

javabytes

I finally tried it out, I ended up getting a 13 Pro Max and am doing a massive bit of phone shuffling between separate devices I've used for personal and for work stuff over the years, and to help move an elderly family member onto one of my older devices. I have iTunes/iCloud backups and all that stuff, but I always like to periodically copy my photos straight off the phone into a desktop photos folder (Windows). Saved me from pulling my hair out with the litany of error messages and 0KB files I usually encounter when trying to do file copies from the device's internal storage.

BobbySteel

There are some bugs lately where the travelpass gets triggered even with no data use so usually best imo to disable travelpass entirely. You shouldn't incur any charges and incoming sms should still be free.

javabytes

“Shouldn’t” is somewhat worrisome when the day pass itself “shouldn’t” be triggered either. But instead of a minimal day charge that has to come off the bill, potentially astronomical pay-as-you-go rates are charged.

Dubai Stu

I have an 11 Pro and go back and forth. I would like the 5G and the ability to put both my ESIMs leaving the slot open for my roaming SIM.

BobbySteel

so far nothing bad hit

Dubai Stu

Everyone talks about turning off data roaming, but don’t you also need to turn off voice roaming to be safe?

IslesFan

Does your iPhone still have a setting for voice roaming? Mine does not. (T-Mobile & Verizon)