Japan Phone and Mobile wifi

After much consternation we made our decision at the Airport. Wanting a Japan phone for convenience we rented a phone for 350 yen per day for 18 days. It costs 80 yen per min for outbound calls and free inbound. (Only domestic)

For mobile wifi we rented a mobile wifi with back up battery for 9700 yen. It was delivered to the airport post office.

We are three days into out trip and the mobile wifi is great for out iPads and American phones for data. We also use the data for Google Voice Mail to call the U S free.

The phone was rented from ABCRental at Narita Airport and the mobi wifi from japan wireless online.

I am not professing this is the best way to go but only it is working great for us and the wifi works flawlessly allowing us to always have the Internet. I was even able to get on Netflix and it worked. I didn't do anymore than to see if I could get online so I don't know about the speed. I use a VPN that allows me to use Netflix in Japan.

I just purchase 2 usim from hong kong

approximate 3050yen for a data only sim with 15GB usage for upto 7 days to use on the softbank 3G network.

approximate 800yen for a call only sim, both local and international call are reasonable cheap on 3G network.

I also have a adapter to allow me to put 2 sims in my phone, and I will be bringing along my novatel wireless mifi if I need to use a hotspot.

A word of caution... We received a text from AT&T and they said we have used $500 of data from AT&T. They tell me that we are still using mins of AT&T mins using our iPhone and google voice.

The only solution I know is to use only my non AT&T iPad to make free google voice calls.

They are giving me a break on the 500.00 bill.

I just don't want to give bad information to users here.

A word of caution... We received a text from AT&T and they said we have used $500 of data from AT&T. They tell me that we are still using mins of AT&T mins using our iPhone and google voice.

How were you placing the calls, via the google voice app? You should be using a service like talkatone that turns your google voice account into a standalone voip service to get free/cheap internet based calls. Otherwise, dialing via google voice will use your (international) voice minutes.

You can verify that you are making calls via the internet by turning on airplane mode, and then turning on wifi only. Good thing they are giving you a break on the charges.