[telecom] Being Smart About Phone Fees Overseas

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Being Smart About Phone Fees Overseas

Stephanie Rosenbloom MARCH 19, 2014

YOU WANT TO USE your smartphone while traveling abroad. But choosing an affordable method can seem mind-numbingly complicated. Should you buy an international roaming plan? And if you do, what does 100 megabytes of data get you anyway? Perhaps you need a hot spot pass? Or a SIM card? If you don't want an eye-popping phone bill, it's essential to decide before you're on the plane.

"The pain you can get from just a couple of mistakes can be big," said Bill Menezes, a principal research analyst covering mobile services for the technology research firm Gartner.

With a little planning, however, you can stay in touch and on budget. Let's walk through the three simplest ways to do just that, from the most obvious to more creative (and cheaper) solutions.

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