Andrew

Sounds good - but be careful about actually using the SIM at home in the US. Once you add credit to the SIM, you would be using it at very expensive roaming rates outside of Europe. If you accidentally aren't connected to WiFI, even 1MB of data costs something exorbitant. But until you add any credit (which I'd probably do ASAP actually, just to make sure you have a US credit card that is accepted), while the SIM still has zero credit on it, it's safe to try it in various phones.

It's always nice to have so much data that you don't have to worry about using it all up! And 10 euros is nothing compared to how much you are saving.

Just be sure you add a +1 to any US phone number you try to call from overseas while you have the Vodafone SIM in place, otherwise Hangouts will try to complete the call as a domestic Dutch call. Your contacts probably don't have the +1 in front of them (you could add it) so won't work automatically just by searching Hangouts to your contacts.

Hangouts is great for what it is. Be sure you try it out to understand its quirks so you aren't surprised. I've used it quite a lot now and for a while. I've made very long calls on it. Occasionally it fades out and you have to ask someone to repeat themselves, but it doesn't happen quite often enough to annoy me. Sometimes Hangouts doesn't start a call the instant you answer it - you may have to wait 2-3 seconds. Once you've used it a bit you get used to these things, but it is a tad different from using the phone's regular dialer to make and answer calls.

misterbill

Good point about adding the money now. I just tried, and my card issuer (Bank of America) sent me texts indicating that the charge had gone thru, but Vodafone prompted me for name and phone # info at that point (the page after submitting the charge), and then sent me back to the top-up page. I used the cell phone number on the card since that's what I assume they wanted. The other fields were my name and phone number as known to the bank.

Suggestions?

Update: I used the chat feature on their website and got someone who spoke excellent English. He said that he did not see the charge and suggested I call their billing department and gave me a number to call which should be free when using the SIM. I'm going to sleep now and will call in the AM (he said they are open until 8pm their time).

Andrew

The first time I added credit, I remember the same thing. I gave them the phone number of the credit card (the 800 number) so they could verify the charge. It did work the first time, but it wasn't immediate - like you, I got sent back to the original page, like I needed to try again...I waited about five minutes and was about to try again when I re-loaded the main account page - and suddenly, I had the 25 euros I'd added! (Well, 20 euros I was charged for and a 5 euro bonus). It was a bit odd.

So if you try again, wait a bit first to make sure it didn't really go through!

When I added credit again a few weeks ago, it worked more smoothly - didn't have to provide any of that extra info.

misterbill

Thanks - I just checked and it's there! It's sad that the CS person I chatted with didn't suggest the same!

Signed up for the 3gb bundle. I had put the SIM back in my LG and got text messages saying that it was set up

US data is not an issue because I have the phones set up not to roam.

misterbill

So... I am back from my trip and sadly I have to report it did not work as expected and while it wasn't a total failure it was still disappointing. It worked fine as soon as I got to Amsterdam and throughout my visit there. I stopped at a Vodafone store to remove the SIM's PIN code but the guy couldn't figure out how to reset it, although that was not a big deal.

When I got to the first port in Norway, I had voice service but not data. I found free Wifi but couldn't figure out which Vodafone number to call. Then when it did not work the following day (different port), I got back on free Wifi and found a number to call and spoke to someone at Vodafone. Three calls later (after running out of minutes since the call was not free from Norway, although the last person I spoke to added some extra minutes) and they determined that they problem was that I was unable to add the Vodafine APN and that was why data was not working. I did some Googling and determined that there is an issue with the Samsung S7 and being able to add APN's, even though the phone is not locked. I never found a solution that worked, so I just stuck with Wifi where I could find it. It worked fine again once I hit Amsterdam. I had noticed that it was running some sort of setup when I first connected in Amsterdam and that never finished, and it did the same thing at the 2nd port in Norway. I'm not sure if it was trying to add the APN or what.

So.. in the end I did save the money I would have paid Verizon, but definitely could have used the 10 euro package (of course I did end up with extra minutes that were useful when calling Vodafone. I do give kudos to Vodafone because I got employees who spoke good English on all 3 calls. I was thinking that I should have also brought my old LG G2 as a backup and it would have worked, but I just tried adding an APN on that and it also seems to be locked. So I'm not sure how well that would have worked.

Andrew

Yes, I have had to add an APN (Access Point Name) on older phones but not with the phones I have bought since 2015 and not with my Vodafone SIM. Newer phones seem able to add the APN automatically, and this is how it worked for me when I moved from Italy to Slovenia back to Italy to France...and recently when I moved from Spain to Portugal back to Spain. Because the S7 is fairly new(?), I'm surprised it was an issue for you. It might be on your old LG too.

Adding an APN doesn't seem intuitive on an Android, but there are how-tos and YouTube demos. On the Android phone in front of me (a Verizon phone with a GSM SIM in it at the moment), when I bring up "Access Point Names" in Cellular Settings, with a working GSM SIM in it, it says "Access Point Name settings are not available for this user," but when I tap the greyed out "plus in a circle" at the upper right, it me a screen with a bunch of fields in it; you really need to set only three of them:

APN: live.vodafone.com
Username: vodafone
Password: vodafone

(leave the rest of the fields alone)

and then from the "three dots" menu in the upper right, choose "Save."

Bumer you had trouble with this - I wish you had posted here from one of your WiFi spots so I could have explained this.

APNs do not even show up when I have my Sprint SIM in a phone, so you probably won't see Access Point Names with your Verizon SIM in place, only with a GSM SIM like the Vodafone SIM. Sprint and Verizon use CDMA at home so don't use APNs, it seems. So they might be invisible. You could put your Vodafone SIM back in the phone now and try setting the APN if you want (for next time!). Keep the phone on WiFi and disable data roaming of course so you don't start using data!

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The four-digit PIN you had to type is a security feature (common on prepaid European SIMs) that you can easily remove in Android settings (once you know what to look for! I usually don't at first on each new version of Android) under Security and "SIM card lock." I always remove this PIN as soon as I insert a new SIM the first time because it's a PITA.

Glad to hear Vodafone has English-speaking operators! FYI, they also have online chat on their website, if you want to skip calling them.