TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums US VI and Puerto Rico Verizon Wireless Issues in San Juan?

Part of our wedding party arrived yesterday, with no cell service. Hotel explained Verizon is now using a newer provider. Night clerk at the hotel figured out how to get there Verizon service to work.. Hhmmm, don't think I want that.. Anyone aware of how this works or what to do? We could trying calling Verizon here, but we all know how well THAT turns out...

Unfortunately Verizon is not very VI/PR friendly, about $2 a minute roaming. Go to Walmart, or any box store and buy a prepaid AT&T phone.

Sail2Wind, Sorry to say, but you are wrong. Verizon is Puerto Rico friendly. My stop in SJU on my return from the BVIs is where I pull out my Verizon phone with no concern for roaming fees.

Wish I could help the OP on the latest Verizon development, but I have no advice as this is new since my February trip. I'd probably be willing to gamble on the "fix" provided by the hotel staff...

must be just the VI's, sorry for the P.R. error

sail2wind you are correct - the VI is not Verizon friendly... at this time

Ok I could have this wrong, but I think they may be feeling growing pains.

The government run Puerto Rico Telephone Service was sold to GTE many moons ago

Not sure how Verzion Wireless / GTE relationship worked, but into 2005 Verizon sold to a Dom Rep/Mexico corporation that is known on island as CLARO.

However Verizon and CLARO must have had an agreement, so your Verizon was still local in PR and life was good for the everyday traveler.

Recently, (end of 2013) Verizon decided it wanted to have a full presence back on the island, and was or has procured a small provider in PR called Open Mobile. The target was to bring the new Verizon on line in the April timeframe.

So what the guest may be encountering is that buy out did happen and now CLARO will tack on Roaming Charges to Verizon customers as Verizon rebuilds or expands the much smaller Open Mobile network on the island.

The wedding party MAY (emphasize MAY) be experiencing this transition.

Tom--thanks for the additional info. I know Verizon used to be non-roaming on PR, but sounds like things are a changin'.

One should still not be charged for roam in PR.
There advertisement says PR is in network
If you get billed for roaming charges while on PR you are a short customer service call away from it being fixed.

In St John we lock on to the BVI towers and have been charged for roaming. When we get back, I call AT&T and they say "No Problem Mon" and eliminate the charge.

Hope it works out for them.

in STJ AT&T is free with Verizon, not so much

Just returned a few days ago and we did have Verizon service. However, my phone (2 yr old Droid) showed 1x most of the time. My husband's phone (new droid) had 3-4g the whole time. Calls made there Verizon to Verizon were glitch (cutting in & out). A call received from Texas was loud & clear...

of course you'll have service, wait for your bill next month

Depends on where you are in PR, Verizon can be horrible.

What about Sprint? We're going to have a long layover in SJU on the way back from St. Maarten at the end of this month. Wondering how Sprint service is there.

At the airport it should be fine. But they also have wifi.

I thought you have to pay for the wifi at the airport? We're going to be there for like 3 hours...

Admirals's Club? You have membership? Worth $25 to hang out, have drinks and wifi for 3 hours.........
i

Nope, no Admiral's Club membership. Are you saying it's only $25 for a single day membership??

$50

But we'd have to pay for 2, correct?

I don't know if wireless is free at international now but just recently at all the smaller airports ( isla grande, Vieques, Culebra, etc) it is free.

Carol, 2 options, $50 pass pp for one day or a $100 a month for a family. So if you use it round trip, its a bargain. Free drinks, munchies, high speed internet, showers, nice comfortable chairs, quiet and always somewhere to sit without rubbing elbows, totally worth it.Any time we have more then a 2 hours layover we use the Admirals Club.

Ok my bad, $50 pp. We don't pay so I wasn't that sure.
But it is worth it as Sail2wind mentioned.
And those Bloody Mary's add up! LOL
Plus local newspapers, check in help etc.
Cheers
irina

We're only going to be there for about 3 hours in the evening, on the way home from a trip. $100 is too steep for that, for me..

Carol, round trip it's $25 pp, that 2 Bloody Marys in the downstairs bars. If you are flying RT it's definitely worth it.

As I said, it's not round trip, just return. Our trip down, we had a 45 minute connection.