Can You Use Your Phone at Sea?
How do Phones Work at Sea?
When you look at the top deck of a cruise ship, you'll often see that cruse ships have two, or sometimes three, large white metal balls. This houses important equipment like the radar, WiFi and the all important satellite telephone. I refer to this set up as "the ball of bankruptcy", for obvious reasons. This satellite telephone is switched on whenever you're more than 12 miles from the port, and will remain turned on whenever you're at sea. This technology is how you get a mobile phone signal when you're at sea....and how you could potentially get a big phone bill.
How Much Does Using a Cruise Ship Phone Network Cost?
Maritime Network charges are largely known as extortionate. The cost is set by your phone provider, not the cruise line, so it will vary depending on what network you are with, not what ship you're on. Regardless, the charges are always ridiculously high. You could expect to be charged around £5-£10 per MB (yes, that's megabyte, not gigabyte). Typically, those branded email newsletters that we all ignore are around 3-5mb, so accidentally opening a single email message could set you back as much as £50. Calls cost in the region of £3-£5 per minute and a single text could set you back as much as £1.50.
How do You Know if You've Connected to the Marine Network?
Most mobile phone companies will send you a text to let you know when you've connected to the marine network, and will either let you know how much it costs or they'll just warn you that it's expensive. Even if you don't get a text, you can check whether you're connected to the maritime network by looking at the name of the network at the top of your phone screen - it might say something like "Marine Tel", "Ship to Shore" or "Telenor M". If you see any of these names, don't use your phone! Just to confuse matters, one of Scandinavia's most popular phone providers is called Telenor - so if you're cruising in Scandinavia and see "Telenor" on your phone, double check to see if there's an M next to it, or wait for a text from your phone provider.
How Can You Avoid Connecting to the Marine Network?
If you want to avoid spending hundreds of pounds accidentally downloading junk mail, the only surefire method to avoid connecting to Marine Tel is by putting your phone on airplane mode when you leave port. You can do this in your phone's settings, or by swiping either up or down (depending on your phone) to access the quick settings. Touch the airplane icon and you're good to go! Airplane mode will turn your wifi off automatically, but you can turn your wifi back on while your phone is in airplane mode.
How do You Stay Connected at Sea?
It's entirely possible to stay connected with your friends and family while you're on a cruise, without connecting to the ball of bankruptcy. Most cruise lines have wifi on board which you can connect to for a fee. It's expensive, but it's much cheaper than connecting to the marine network! On my last cruise, Fred Olsen were charging £112 for unlimited data for 14 nights. Fred Olsen is one of many cruise lines now using StarLink, which means the wifi is a lot more reliable than it used to be! Some cruise lines are even starting to offer free wifi, either as standard or as part of temporary promotions. Princess Cruises now have a package that includes wifi and your drinks as part of the cruise fare (not the lowest fare, sadly!).
If you want to minimise the amount you're spending then consider skipping the wifi all together and just wait until you're in port to catch up with everyone. Check your network provider's roaming fees before you go - some networks still give you access to free roaming in the EU, while others have deals to minimise your phone bill while using your phone worldwide. A lot of network providers offer for you to buy add on passes that allow you to use your usual allowance of minutes, texts and data in a country outside of your standard roaming for as little as £10 per month.
A Little Trick to Send Text Messages for Free -
A lot of cruise lines allow you to connect to the wifi without paying - it will allow you to access the cruise line's website and use their app, but won't allow access to the internet. It's when you connect to the wifi without buying a package that iPhones can sometimes send messages without internet.
So far, I've discovered that Celebrity Cruises, Royal Caribbean, MSC and Princess Cruises wifi allows you to send iMessages without paying for a wifi package. Fred Olsen, Ambassador Cruise Line and P&O wifi sadly doesn't allow this trick. If you have an iPhone and you're going on a cruise line not mentioned above, it's worth giving this trick a go. Just connect to the on board wifi, then when the login page loads you need to close it and click "use without internet". This is how you can access the on board app without paying for wifi, but you then go to your text messages and look for one that's blue (this shows that both you and the person you want to message have an iPhone). Try sending a message - it might look like it's taking forever to send or it will say "not delivered", which means this hack doesn't work, but if you try it and it sends and says "delivered" under it, then the hack worked and you can send iMessages for free!
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