So --- it has been several busy weeks for me, getting ready for school and the transfer to the US.I'm now (more or less) settled in our apartment. I've bought a laptop, purchased groceries and supplies with my roommate, gotten a bank account, registered my immigration documents, etc, etc, and purchased a prepaid SIM for my mobile phone.
For us Filipinos, who have forever been spoiled by the mobile carriers in the Philippines, the calling and texting rates in the US will come as a shock. Imagine being charged for incoming calls and incoming texts! Heck, you even get charged for accessing voicemail. It seems that nothing is free, and you start missing the unlimited calls, texts and rewards you get in the Philippines for very affordable prices.
Enter Google Voice.
Google Voice is this great service from the popular world-dominating force that lets you send and receive SMS messages in the US for free. The full, working version can even transcribe voicemail (!), save your SMS messages in your email, and route your calls to any and all phones you configure in your Google Voice account. Home or office, landline or mobile -- it doesn't matter. All you need is a Google Voice account, a WiFi connection (or data plan) and a smartphone (works best with Android, I believe).
To get the full suite of Google Voice features for free, you have to have a new number, courtesy of Google. (Or get a phone plan from Sprint, I think.) If you think that's such a hassle, then you can port your existing number to Google Voice, pay the $20 activation fee, terminate your old number and change it to a new one without terminating your line, which, hopefully, will not be such a hassle as it sounds. There are very helpful people who document how they ported their existing number to Google Voice around the web; all you need to do is search for them on the almighty Google.
For those like me who just need an alternative to the expensive SMS rates in the US and want to manage their prepaid load better, then there's this procedure:
From Technobuffalo: How to Get Free Text Messages with Google Voice
I've tried this, and it works! Of course, the free WiFi on campus makes it very convenient to use around school. Outside school, there are quite a number of places that offer free WiFi so I can use this there too.
I've given people my actual number but, when I have WiFi connection, I'd text them using my Google Voice number and just add in my name so that they'd know it was me. Usually, they text back to my Google Voice number so I can save on both incoming and outgoing SMS.
The one downside I can see to this is people texting you on your Google Voice number at a time when you don't have any data connection. A possible remedy to this is reminding people to use your mobile number when calling or texting you. At least, with Google Voice, you can save on outgoing SMS from time to time.
