Forget about it.... St John is horrible unless you have Cingular. Although you will have reception in Cruz Bay and Coral Bay. Watch out for roaming charges, the don't consider us people part of the US plan so you get dinged at like $2 a minute.

thanks stu!
a little slow this morning and not sure if i'm reading your response correctly . . .are you saying that i would get service in cruz bay and coral bay with verizon? or only with cingular?
thx

You may or may not receive a signal with Verizon but you will DEFINITELY receive a huge bill if you do.

No you should receive Verizon service in those areas. But you will be roaming. I called them out on it when I got back and they refunded the money, because for me it was an honest mistake, my phone never said roaming. I started out by asking if my plan covered all of the US, they said yes, and then I said well.....

Good luck.

So what's the bottom line on how I should call home when I'm in either the USVI or BVI's???

I have Verizon, but certainly don't want to get hit with roaming charges.

call collect... Or buy a pre paid phone card and use that. You get like 500 minutes to the states for $5. Good bargain.

Worldtalk is the best rate card to the states.

Sprint PCS also works - no roaming charges either.

I have Verizon and when I called they said I do get service in the USVI but I will definitely be roaming. They couldn't tell me what the cost would be per minute because calls route through so many other carriers. That sounded VERY expensive.

I have Verizon Service. I have an all inclusive LD/roaming plan. On previous visits I have had no problems getting in-network Verizon coverage. Our last trip two weeks ago was different. I attribute the diffence to one of two reasons: 1) Perhaps Verizon has changed sharing agreements with other carriers since my last visit, OR 2) previously I have used tri-mode phones which would connect to an analog signal - I have changed all our phones and all now can only connect to a digital signal.

Prior to our recent visit I called Verizon to verify coverage and was told to do the *228 update and to enable international dailing, which we did. I was also told that sometimes we would have in-network coverage and sometimes we might be roaming. I was told roaming charges would be 69 cents per minute.

My experience:
We had in-nework coverage twice. Upon our arrival at STT airport in about a 4 square foot area outside the luggage area. In downtown in another 4 square foot area. At all other times on STT or STJ our roaming indicators were lit. Since our trip straddled a monthly cutoff I know that we were billed 69 cents per minute (so far - we'll see if they add-on when I get the next bill).

On St Thomas we had coverage (roaming) at the airport, downtown and at Red Hook. As we stayed on STJ that's all I really noticed.

We had coverage on the ferry from Red Hook to Cruz Bay.

On St John we had coverage (roaming) in Cruz Bay, at the Westin, in Coral Bay, at Shipwreck Landing, at Caneel Bay. We could pick up a signal but not make a connection at Trunk Bay, Cinnamon Bay or Francis Bay. I did not notice elsewhere on the island.

FWIW

I'm here on St. Croix right now and have tried the *228 thing on my Verizon phone a couple of times. It worked fine in Miami but when I try it here I get an audio message in Spanish and a message on my phone that says the reprogramming failed. I am roaming on the center areas of the island and off-network in the east end area. I have received extra charges during previous visits but no surprises, thank goodness. I'm glad it works somewhere here. It's a good excuse to ride down to Cheesburgers!

Wow, how different the reports are. I have Verizon and when we were there in Oct service was perfect. We stayed at the Westin and talked to the kids every night. We had good signals everywhere except on the very east part of St John.

Nextel which my wife has had NO service.

I was very happy with my Verizon service.

I am wondering how good Cingular coverage is on St. John. I am going to be staying at the Westin, and I noticed that there has been discussion about Verizon, Sprint and Nextel. How is the Cingular coverage and is it included in the plan or will roaming charges apply? Thanks for the help...

Steve

in december we used both cingular and t mobile on st thomas and st john
just had to be careful with cingular near red hook sometimes it roams to british virgins and they charge extra so keep an eye out
for the most part we were fine and called all the time including phone to phone
service goes down as you are driving between CA and red hook but them picks up

has anyone used nextel there?

steve,

had exceptional coverage with cingular from various hillside locations on west end of stj and northern beaches except west end of cinnamom bay. had good reception at maho so i believe normally if you can see stt, you'll have a good signal. BUT watch out on the east end of island for signal pickup from tower on tortolla. i got complacent and didn't watch and was hit with a couple of very expensive short calls.

you should have good coverage at westin, but i have never tried from there.

papabou

If you have Nextel, forget about it. No service anywhere on the islands.

Did you get an answer regarding cell phone service on STJ Island with Vorizon??

You can use Verizon, however, you will have roaming charges. In some locations on STJ you will not have coverage. Cinuglar has the best coverage with no roaming. Someone had suggested buying their go phone which comes with minutes that you can buy. If you intend to make a lot of calls this would be your best bet. The last time I used Verizon it was 69 cents a minute roaming.