buying a phone in Japan

We have a nephew from Chicago that is just starting to go to school at
Temple Univ in Tokyo.
He mentioned to his family, that he couldn't buy a new phone for use over
there
until he gets his student ID.... I think his family phones are all Sprint.

Any idea about this - buying a phone in Japan for a new student resident ?

And in general, if a person has a US issued GSM phone, like from ATT,
will it work in other countries - and what billing issues, other costs, or
logistics pop up ?

--
----------------------------------
"If everything seems to be going well,
you have obviously overlooked something." - Steven Wright

On Wed, 27 Aug 2008, ps56k posted:
> We have a nephew from Chicago that is just starting to go to school at
> Temple Univ in Tokyo. He mentioned to his family, that he couldn't buy a
> new phone for use over there until he gets his student ID....

Correct. In general, you need some form of Japanese ID to buy cell phone
service in Japan. Otherwise you're stuck with roaming or renting a phone
at one of the airport kiosks (both expensive options)

> I think his family phones are all Sprint.

Verizon and Sprint phones currently won't roam in Japan. There is a
possibility that they may roam in Japan in a few years when KDDI changes
its non-standard CDMA bands to the world standard.

There is no GSM in Japan. To roam in Japan, you need a phone with UMTS
(3G) in the 2100 band. Some AT&T and T-Mobile phones have this.

If you have a Verizon world phone, it will not roam in Japan, but you can
take the Verizon SIM card and put it in a 2100 band 3G phone and that will
roam in Japan (I've done it).

> Any idea about this - buying a phone in Japan for a new student resident ?

Ask at the school for what is the most popular with the students. I have
my own preferences for phone service in Japan, but my interests are not
the same as students.

> And in general, if a person has a US issued GSM phone, like from ATT,
> will it work in other countries - and what billing issues, other costs, or
> logistics pop up ?

Roaming in Japan is expensive. It is much cheaper to get domestic
Japanese service with NTT DoCoMo, Softbank, tu-ka, KDDI, Willcom, etc.
NTT DoCoMo and Softbank may be the best choices, since those phones will
roam in the US (albeit expensively).

-- Mark --

http://panda.com/mrc
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to eat for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.

Mark Crispin wrote:

> If you have a Verizon world phone, it will not roam in Japan, but you
> can take the Verizon SIM card and put it in a 2100 band 3G phone and
> that will roam in Japan (I've done it).



How could you have done it since Verizon doesn't use SIM cards?

In message <48b65eb7$0$17195$742ec2ed@news.sonic.net> Anthony Guzzi
<dukeofurl@sonic.net> wrote:

>Mark Crispin wrote:
>
>> If you have a Verizon world phone, it will not roam in Japan, but you
>> can take the Verizon SIM card and put it in a 2100 band 3G phone and
>> that will roam in Japan (I've done it).
>
>How could you have done it since Verizon doesn't use SIM cards?

In Canada, TELUS (CDMA) issues SIM cards for dual-mode (CDMA+GSM)
phones, or when you plan on roaming and specifically request a GSM SIM
card.

They aren't used on the domestic CDMA networks.