[upnorthkyosa]

My wife and I are planning on taking a trip to NZ in August and one of the things we are looking into purchasing is a Satallite phone. I lead wilderness trips back here in the states, so this phone wouldn't just be for the trip. My question is this, does anyone have any experience using these over there? If so, what service do you use? What brand?

If we decide to not to go the Satphone route for our trip and get a mobile, what kind of plans are available for travelers? Can we use our own phones, or do we need to get phones in NZ? Are there rental options?

[kanatakiwi]

For your phone to work in NZ it has to operate on either the 900 and 1800 MHz frequencies. In the USA and Canada, the 1900 MHZ frequency is used, which means that handsets that operate on this frequency simply do not work in New Zealand. My lovely new LG camera phone that I bought in Canada did not work here, but my cheap second hand Nokia worked fine because it was a triband phone.

Triband phones (also known as world phones or international phones) work across all three frequencies and therefore allow you to travel freely between countries without having to change your mobile phone.

So if you have a triband phone, that works worldwide then you just have to bring it along and get it unlocked if its locked, or if not just buy a Sim card here ($35). I brought a Nokia phone which meant I had no choice but to go with Vodaphone, because my phone was not compatible with Telecom. This was not a problem for me as I like Vodaphone, some people say that Telecom provides more complete coverage in rural areas, but I'm in Auckland so dont know about that. However others on this forum can tell you about that. Whichever one you go with the plans are not cheap. Calls from land lines to mobiles cost a heap here and mobile to mobile is also expensive, most people here rely on texting and there are cheap packages for that. For travellers the best option would be to buy prepay cards and load them on your phone as needed.

You can rent mobiles here, we did it once when we here for a two week visit, its not cheap though and probably we could have bought a phone for the price we paid. If you go this route, there is a Vodaphone shop at the airport that does this, although if you go this route you might be better off to rent a phone in the US that is usable here, its bound to be cheaper, as nearly everything here is much more expensive than North America or UK.
Hope this helps
G

[upnorthkyosa]

Thanks a bunch, that was very helpful. I knew there was a lot of BS to wade through regarding mobiles, so that is why I was considering the satallite option.