Mobile Phone Rental & Prepaid Options in Japan
I often get asked about options for renting a mobile phone in Japan.
Softbank Global Rental
You can rent either a phone with SIM, a SIM card only to use in your own phone, or a phone to use with your SIM card. Nokia is the only phone-only option at the moment, but hopefully they'll start to offer Windows Mobile devices soon now we have one with an English interface. Daily rental rates seem good and incoming calls are free, but outgoing calls are expensive.
Go Mobile
Advantages of Go Mobile include advance notification of your rental phone number when the phone is shipped and long term plans if you need the phone more than 90 days. Once again - no Windows Mobile devices at the moment.
Update: I see Softbank also offers an option to be notified of the phone number you will receive in advance.
You are sure to find other options at the airport.
Another option is buying a prepaid phone. Here is prepaid phone information from Softbank and AU. (DoCoMo does not have a prepaid service). Although identification is required, there is nothing on either site about a requirements for an address in Japan? Has anyone got any experience with this?
1 comment:
Andrew,
This week I had to procure 4 phones for co-workers coming in from the states. They were told by their stateside carriers that their blackberry's would not work in Japan.
I had a coworker check with the softbank store in Yokohama for prepaid phones as I wanted them to keep the same phone number for a 6 month project. Softbank wanted 40,000 yen for a basic nokia phone plus the cost of the prepaid cards which are 3,000 yen for a 30 minute card and 5,000 yen for a 55 minute card. Free incoming calls and 90 yen per minute for calls to the states. At 40,000 yen per phone this was not an option.
While at the Softbank store at Yokota Airbase near Tachikawa I asked what their prepaid phones cost and they quoted me $32.00 USD per phone same cost on the prepaid phones so I immeditely purchased the 4 phones plus cards. I was told if I had purchased them the week before they were only $28 USD and the week before that $18USD on special sale.
The minutes are good for 60 days and the phone number is good for 1 year. It took me 2 days to get the phones activated as softbank will only allow 3 phones per day to be activated.
The on-base softbank did require a stateside drivers license, though I think they would have accepted a japanese license or geijin card as well they also require a US post office box (APO) address which requires either active duty or SOFA status.
I have recently made trips to Hawaii, Alaska, and Arizona where I was able to purchase prepaid phones for $25 USD thru Virgin with various pricing on the cards.
It seems that the phone companies in Japan do not want to promote a prepaid service, they want you to lock into a contract.
This was my experience,
Regards,
Robert Leonard
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