When it comes to international calls, Verizon as well as most other carriers differentiates these into a couple of categories. It’s not the same thing to be making an international call from your phone when you’re on home soil. As it would be to make an international call when you’re abroad. What we mean by it’s not the same is that the rates for those calls may not be similar at all. Whether you’re going to be traveling, or you need to make calls to people across the globe from your couch, this is an article that you’re going to want to read as a Verizon customer. The goal here is to break down all of the potential costs of international calls Verizon charges.
As is the case with most of the content on this site, what we want to do is give you a ton of options. To make sure that you’re able to choose the calling method that suits your needs the best. While at the same time potentially saving you some of your hard-earned cash. International calls used to be a major hassle. These days, there are different ways to connect with people who are living in other countries. Plenty of these methods may tend to be cheaper and even less complex than picking up your phone and dialing a number. Here are some of the topics that we are going to go through in this article.
- The Rates Could Heavily Depend On Your Plan
- International Calls Verizon While At Home Rates
- International Calls Verizon While Abroad Rates
- Calling Through Apps
- What’s The Cheapest Option?
- Should You Limit The Amount of Calls That You Make While Abroad?
The Rates Could Heavily Depend On Your Plan
The rate you pay is literally going to depend on your plan, but maybe not in the way that you’re thinking. Most of the plans that you can go out and get on Verizon are pretty much the same. What makes most of these plans vary is really the add-ons that you’re going to be able to activate. When it comes to international calls, Verizon offers different add-gons that you can pay extra from your regular rate to be able to get those “premium rates”. In short, you have to pay an extra fee to be able to be charged less per call.
This can get really confusing because it’s hard to determine whether that add-on for international calls is something that you’re taking advantage of. If you’re on the phone with people from all over the world all day, obviously you should pay extra and get the premium rates. If you’re a bit on the fringe though where you only make a couple of international calls a month, paying the extra fee may not be worth it. One of the good things about Verizon though is that you’re going to have the option of adding international calls to your plan on virtually all of the plans that they offer across the board. Most of the time, you won’t have to upgrade your plan to be able to access these add-ons. If you find that you do, and you make a lot of international calls, maybe changing service providers is an option.
International Calls Verizon While At Home Rates
If you’re a brand-new Verizon customer or if you haven’t added any type of extra fee for international calls on your plan, you’re going to start on the base rate. There’s no reason to sugarcoat this, the base rate is insane! You’ll be having to pay 49 cents a minute, plus probably some other air time fee. Just a quick call abroad can see you pay a few dollars. You can kind of look at this as the glass being half empty or half full. You may end up paying around 10 dollars for a couple of quick calls abroad. That doesn’t sound like much, but percentage-wise for a 30-35 dollar line it’s a lot.
What happens if you make quite a few calls abroad per month? If that’s the case, then paying the regular rate really is not an option. For a few calls a month, you may want to go with the Global Calling upgrade. This is actually a very good option for people who generally make calls to Mexico and Canada from home. All that you are going to have to do is pay an extra 5 dollars on your line. With that, you’ll get unlimited calls to Mexico and Canada. As well as a rate of 0.05 a minute to most other countries in the world. This is certainly the best value deal. Five dollars is about what you would use up in about the same number of calls abroad on the regular rate.
There are two other options that you are going to have if you’re a little more global. Really, these plans are for people who have families in specific parts of the world. The other option is for folks who maybe have a very global business. The Global Calling Plus upgrade is going to allow you to make unlimited calls to 60 countries. At the same time, you’ll be getting a .05 rate per minute to all of the other countries that you can call with a Verizon line. We know, 15 dollars doesn’t sound like a big deal, but for a lot of people, that can almost reach 50% of the total cost for the line per month!
The last option is to go with a Global Choice plan. In this one, you’re allowed to pick a country and get limited minutes, usually about 180 per month. The cost of this extra fee is ten dollars. This could also be an interesting option for folks who have families in a specific country abroad. Maybe rates to that country are not necessarily all that friendly on some of the other options that are available.
International Calls Verizon While Abroad Rates
These can get really expensive, particularly on the pay as you go rate. So much so that it may make sense to get the international travel pass for that day, even if you’re just going to make a couple of calls. Here’s why, if you call Mexico or Canada while abroad, you’re going to be paying virtually a dollar a minute to make that call. That’s the lowest per minute rate on, pay as you do for countries when you’re abroad. If you get the day pass, you’ll be able to activate your regular allowances. All of the unlimited plans on Verizon have calls to Mexico and Canada.
The per minute rates on calls when you’re abroad are as follows: $0.99/min, $1.79/min, $2.99/min. The first-rate is for calls to Mexico, Canada, and Guam. The second rate applies to 130 countries and the other to 80. Calling home to the United States or places like Puerto Rico applies a domestic rate. So you shouldn’t get charged for the call? Potentially no, but some fees could apply from the foreign network that you may have to hook up to. Calling home may not bring forth per minute rate charges. You could be dealing with other fees. These fees tend to change per country, and per whenever your service provider feels like it!
Calling Through Apps
Calling through apps if you’re going to make an international call, particularly when you’re at home, is potentially the best way to go. Why is this? It’s really simple if you have an unlimited, or you’re connected to a Wi-Fi network you are going to be able to make calls through apps like WhatsApp, Telegram, and even Facebook Messenger without having to worry about per minute rates. Obviously, the biggest problem with doing this is that the person that you want to call has to be on these apps. The other option is to make a Zoom call, where you just send the person a link to the conversation. You can do the same thing through Google meet.
The problem with calling through apps other than making sure that the person you want to call is that you may not have a ton of data while abroad. However, if you can get good Wi-Fi in a hotel or even through coverage from the local SIM card that you bought, they can start making sense. The worst thing that you can do is try and make a call through an app using the pay as you go rate for data. Make sure you know where your coverage is coming from if you’re going to make a call through an app when you’re abroad. Otherwise, the data usage from the call could be way more expensive than the pay per minute rate!
What’s The Cheapest Option?
It really depends on whom you want to call, how many calls you need to make, where you want to call! That being said, the cheapest way to call someone is to do it through an app on a free Wi-Fi network. We are not saying it’s the safest way that you can make a call, but for extensive purposes, these calls are going to be free. This is always going to be a good thing to know because you literally never know when it may come in handy. You could potentially make one of these calls with a phone without a SIM Card. You just need to make sure that you have access to the internet.
Now, if you’re someone who constantly needs to make calls directly to landlines, for example, then looking at the global calling upgrade and some of the other options that we’ve described before could totally make sense as well. Actually, if you’re going to make a lot of calls, the last thing that you want is to stay on a pay-per-minute scheme. You’re always going to be getting the short end of the stick there. Even if you’re on the call for a couple of seconds, it gets rounded up to a minute. When those calls start piling up, you can rack up a massive bill!
Should You Limit The Amount of Calls That You Make While Abroad?
There’s an idea. To be honest, you should probably be looking to limit your calls, your data usage, you’re texting, and everything in between. The reality is, more often than not, using your phone abroad is going to cost you extra cash. Mexico and Canada can be the only 2 exceptions and on some plans not all of them. Calling while abroad though can be a problem. As we mentioned, international calls Verizon users make back home should be charged with domestic rates. That means that they are included in your plan, right? For the most part, yes. That doesn’t mean you can’t get hit with an extra fee from the service provider!
In all honesty, limiting even the amount of time that you spend on your phone period can save you cash. One of the main reasons why people end up overpaying for their service when they are abroad is the involuntary use of data. That’s when you don’t even know your phone is on, but it is, and it’s costing you money. Limiting your calls, minutes, data and texts is usually going to be a good idea. Again, unless you’re sure you’re fully covered in your regular plan! In that case, then, you can afford to use your phone closer to normal. Without forgetting the fact that if you use too much data, the speed is going to drop off!
International Calls Verizon – Conclusion
If you don’t have a plan in place, and you get hit with the pay-as-you-go rates, you’re going to wish you never made those calls. That being said, if you just need to make a couple of calls, paying even 5 dollars extra may be ok for some people. Rather than having to find ways to get cheaper calling deals. The Global Calling Plus can be a really good idea if you have business in places like Canada or Mexico. You get to pay those extra 5 dollars, and you don’t have to worry about the number of minutes that you spend on the call.
If you are the one that is abroad, calling may not be the best idea. Just activating your phone could cost you more than the call itself. If you’re ok with paying the travel pass fee, then things kind of even out. The problems could come more from unwanted data usage than the calls themselves. When you add up some of those pay-per-minute rates, also free calls through a Wi-Fi connection are going to sound really good! Obviously, every person’s needs are different, so it’s hard to give a broad read of everything. Yet, we feel pretty confident that we’ve given you a good idea of what you can do to pay less. While also warning what’ll make you pay more!