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Comment by deepGem | Hacker News Reader

This is a huge pain in many of the airports that I have travelled. In fact, you'll even get ripped off at some. For example Rome. We paid 50 euros for a supposedly Schengen wide 1GB plan but as soon as we left Italy that SIM was useless. So yeah, I'd definitely pay someone if they can just hand me a SIM at a nominal price as soon as I walk out of immigration/baggage claim

Singapore has done this in a great way. As soon as you take your bags and go out there are display boards for SIM purchases - quite quick as well. Super friendly staff.

EDIT: changed Europe to Schengen.

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In Rome buying a sim is a total gamble -- many times they don't even work. I learned to buy the sim, then literally STAND in the same line and install it into my phone. (When I do this the staff at these stores start to get nervous.) If it doesn't work - I hand them back the sim and explain it doesn't work on my phone. They then take my receipt, type something into their computer, restart the phone and explain how it should work now. THEY NEVER check the phone to see if it works they know -- its related to something they are typing on their computer. ALSO, another trick they try is to explain it takes 24 hours. This is a total lie, it wont work after the 24 hours -- i usually just argue until they fix.

Are there people who take the SIM and leave? I always assume everyone stuck around until data was okay on the phone, since sometimes it needs activation, sometimes it needs settings, etc.

In Japan you can buy it at the convenient stores and the "mini" electronic store (haneda) at the airports. Switching sims, setting up the APNs, and the NO REFUND AFTER OPENED on the sticker make people buy it and jump on the bus or train to downtown tokyo (where you have 45mins ~ 1.5 hours to burn anyways).

Hmm, I see. Maybe that's why the ladies selling the SIMs at Haneda were a bit perplexed when I hung around to make sure that it worked.

Yeah, even if you buy a prepaid sim and it doesn't work on your device the store probably won't refund you (unless it's "cracked" or something when you open it).

I've had this happen in the US too. Verizon branded Android phone taken to a Verizon store to get a different sim, assured it would work and then had to walk out after 3+ attempts, calls, and fiddling on the computer.

Even in Singapore, the SIMs are sold at arrival are priced 30-50% above the retail rate and you will have to wait for data activation. I wish AirBnB hosts can offer pre-activated SIM as a value added service (Airport wifi is usually good enough to book an Uber).

Why do you even need to buy SIMs? Are international plans that pricey in the U.S.? Here in Europe they are quite affordable, my Czech 'connect for good for abroad' is $0.35 per MB which is enough in most situations.

The average web page size is now almost 3MB [1]. At that rate, it costs about a dollar to load a single web page and about $350 to download a gig of data. That's not affordable, especially when you can get the same service at a fraction of the cost by buying a local SIM. For instance, it costs $5 for 4GB of data in Cambodia. It would cost you $1,400.

[1] http://httparchive.org/interesting.php

We do have Google Fi, which is $20/mo + $0.01/MB. It works in 180+ countries with no need to swap out SIM cards. The main downside is the lack of phone choice...basically only the Google flagship phones (Pixel and Nexus...not the worst choices) because of something to do with the radio hardware they use.

For the casual traveler, it might not make the most sense, but for someone who does a lot of international travel, it's a great option.

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