01718: Roaming If You Want To?

So my family has a big Singapore trip planned for the holidays in order for us to be all together this year, which is pretty cool. But being the geek that I am, I'm currently obsessing over how I plan to manage my overseas communications while there.

In the past, I've relied on Globe's roaming services to keep myself in the loop, so to speak, primarily relying on my data plan to run apps like WhatsApp. However this is my first trip with my HTC One, which is a pretty robust smartphone, plus it's going to be the longest trip to Singapore thus far. So a Philippines-based data plan may not be the best idea given my charges are going to go through the roof.

This leaves me with several options.

First, I could stay cheap and not go roaming at all. I could just focus on finding suitable WiFi connections in order to stay in touch as needed or piggyback on my sister's devices being used as mobile hot spots. This is a pretty practical idea given I don't foresee the family going on many tourist-like excursions. We have  a tendency to stay in for the most part even when abroad. And that's not a bad thing - staying together is a big part of the holiday.

Second, I could get a data plan prepaid SIM as soon as we arrive at the airport in order to get myself all setup. There's a SIM that goes for 18 SGD that will give me a heck of a lot of data for 5 days of use. Then additional days will only cost 6 SGD a day - which is still worlds better than the 40 USD plan that Globe is offering for a similar period. But the real question is whether or not I'll really need that much mobile data. The fact that it will expire before the trip is up may not be all that practical. Plus I may not fully utilize it.

Lastly, there's the option to get a more conventional tourist-friendly SIM (they start at 15 SGD a pop) and use my temporary Singapore number to sign  up for the practically island-wide Wireless@SG offer. WiFi will mean greater battery consumption while we're out and about, but at least I can stretch this out for the entire Singapore trip. The same considerations in terms of whether or not I really need this much data still come into play though.

At this point, I don't quite know yet how I want to handle things. The first option is the most practical one, but naturally there's a part of me that wants to have the freedom to reach out to Tobie at any time regardless of where I am in SG. A good example is when I'll inevitably head to Paradigm Infinitum and might potentially want to consult with Tobie regarding possible purchases. Or I could just bite the bullet and go with incidental roaming charges for specific events like that and rely on WiFi connections otherwise.