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BEST WAY TO COMMUNICATE WITH OTHER PASSENGERS IN MY GROUP


Hbellomo

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Sailing on the Oasis in a couple of weeks. Since the ship is so large, what’s the best way to communicate with other family members regarding meeting up, where they are, etc? (None of them are interested in purchasing Voom). I’ve been on other ships where you can use their app to communicate with other guests free of charge, but don’t see anything listed except for Voom. 

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My friend and I are also not doing Voom, we're planning on a small whiteboard or even just a notepad and going old school.  ("@ Solarium if you need me", "Wandering around, be back 4:30 to get ready for dinner")

Also packing two different color highlighters for the Compass to highlight what we each think we're interested in going, as that will also probably provide a tentative help to track each other down at any point in the day.

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If all the members in your group have cell phones tell them to call there cellular provider and add the international travel service to there account. It’s an additional $5 per month. This would enable you and the others in your group to use your cell phone and communicate with each other without having to purchase Voom. Hope this helps.

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15 hours ago, Jess said:

If all the members in your group have cell phones tell them to call there cellular provider and add the international travel service to there account. It’s an additional $5 per month. This would enable you and the others in your group to use your cell phone and communicate with each other without having to purchase Voom. Hope this helps.

Check with your cellular provider as some will will cover cellular at sea and some do not.  Verizon's international travel service covers while in port but does not cover service while at sea. For verizon, outgoing texts are $.50 and incoming $.05.  That may work for your group, however, I have teens and that would never work for me.

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7 hours ago, melski94 said:

Check with your cellular provider as some will will cover cellular at sea and some do not.  Verizon's international travel service covers while in port but does not cover service while at sea. For verizon, outgoing texts are $.50 and incoming $.05.  That may work for your group, however, I have teens and that would never work for me.

That is the same 4 T-Mobile, AT&T, and Sprint as well as Verizon. If you do not want to pay the incoming text and outgoing text and incoming calls and outgoing calls fess per call and per text sent and received then you could call one of the providers I said in the first sentence if you have one of those providers and tell them that you are going out of country and would like to add the international travel plan to your account so you and your teens and anyone else in your group can make and receive calls and sent and receive text with out having creating a huge and outrageous travel usage cell phone bill at the end of the cruise Vacation . Most Magor cellular providers have an option of asking you if you would like to add the international travel plan when you call in and tell them that you are going out of the country. The travel plan is not that much ~ should be $5 or less.

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Verizon's $5 Travel Pass does NOT include cruise ships.  Here is from Verizon's International Travel page.  The Travel Pass would cover many of the ports but not while on the ship nor does it cover data.  Now if you are only going to send and receive only a handful of texts, even using the pay as you go rate would be cheaper than VOOM.  The following is copied from Verizon's website.  

*************************************

 

For cruises: Use your phone on more than 400 cruise ships with pay-as-you-go plans. Visit the Trip Planner and enter your ship or destination to check availability.  

Cruise Ship Rates

You can talk and message on more than 400 cruise ships.

Cruise ship Pay as You Go pricing
Voice Pricing $2.99/min
Text Messaging $0.50/message sent$0.05/message received
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If you would like to go on the internet or use any app that requires internet access while onboard the cruise ship then you would have purchase Voom so that you can access the internet, FaceTime, email and your social media accounts. If you are just going to sent and receive texts and make and answer calls then you do not need to purchase Voom but must alert phone company of travel to foreign countries.

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  • 3 weeks later...

@RRoman7, you can use messaging apps like iMessage, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, etc. that all rely 100% on data for sending and receiving. Regular texting will not work with VOOM as it's dependent on a cellular network connection / doesn't work on wifi.

So be sure that everyone you want to talk with, on board or on land, has a smartphone with an agreed-on app installed for communicating. And if everyone you want to message is on board with you, each one will need their own VOOM access code (or you'll need to buy a multi-device plan and share the code).

On a related note, if your phone supports wifi phone calls, you'll be able to call or be called by any phone, smart or otherwise.

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17 hours ago, Lovetocruise2002 said:

Just make sure you put your phone into airplane mode.  Otherwise you might end up with a whole load of extra charges.

And if you have AT&T they have a service-side data switch in their device settings on their app.  Good to use in addition to airplane mode just to make sure there's no gaps anywhere.

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The Royal Carribbean App now has a "beta" feature that allows for guests on the same/linked reservations to chat free over the wifi. I imagine that would require everyone to have RC account. That's free even if you don't have VOOM.

Also, if people buy VOOM you can look at Signal or Telegram. Those are encrypted chat apps that work over Wifi.

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18 minutes ago, LordAsriel said:

The Royal Carribbean App now has a "beta" feature that allows for guests on the same/linked reservations to chat free over the wifi. I imagine that would require everyone to have RC account. That's free even if you don't have VOOM.

Also, if people buy VOOM you can look at Signal or Telegram. Those are encrypted chat apps that work over Wifi.

I second Signal for private messaging and SMS, and Telegram for both group and private messaging.  

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2 minutes ago, JLMoran said:

WhatsApp is also good for private messaging, as it also encrypts the chat on-device. If everyone is on iOS devices, the Messages app is probably best.

+1 for WhatsApp.  That's what we use since I have an iphone and Hubby uses an Android.  We also use this to message and chat with our family back at home when on board.

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  • 1 year later...

Just FYI- Harmony and Allure do have the onboard app where you can message people in your party while on board without VOOM. 

Princess had this and it was great. Not sure why such a great ship like Oasis does not. Would come in handy with coordinating teenagers and big groups. :(

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