I have a number of financial accounts from different providers which require a verification SMS.
What can I do while traveling to be able to access them?
My australian provider's a physical Sim, And overseas would be a physical Sim as well.
my iPhone 14 has 1 SIM slot and supports eSim.
I prefer to not have to keep swapping sims
Pay $80 for 2 roaming packs: receive 18 Bits per sec after a week of mucking around! Crappy Boost is useless.
Chuck Redbull mobile into the esim "slot"
Turn on wifi calls.
Use a burner phone for your overseas sim card.
Enjoy!
Boost is great as long as you don't buy the roaming pack. Receives SMS overseas no problem. Only issue is it takes up a physical sim slot, so would need an esim for the overseas data.
Bear in mind that every country might differ.
Currently in India and Red Bull saves my day!!
change your aussie one to esim, who is your provider?
Catch
Get an esim overseas just for data only.
Switch off data for home sim, so you can receive texts
But not use data. Use iMessage messenger WhatsApp etc when overseas so you don’t incur call charges on home sim.
See below:
https://alosim.com/data-esim-iphone/
Or change you phone number temporarily on your financial Institutions website to the foreign number.
Does this depend on provider?
Catch seems to indicate roaming works automatically, and receiving SMS is free, but my recollection is I didn't receive any SMS because I didn't buy a pack??
Or maybe I'd already moved to Amaysim by then - so am I correct that I need to pay a roaming pack to recieve SMS with Amaysim??
I have the same query as OP.
Yes do this and use Eskimo for travel. I just got back from Bali and it was great. I don’t have duel SIMs so it was a slight pain for me.
I hate it when financial institutions use SMS when Authenticator apps are safer and easy to use.
Does roaming ensure that SMS is available?
Australia uses GSM, would roaming work on the CDMA network?
USA?
Australian phones will not register to a CDMA network. Fortunately I can’t think of a country which doesnt also have 3G/4G services that our phones can use.
I am also interested in the receipt of SMS for the same reason but have an Android phone which does not supports eSim.
I at present have an Aldi Sim installed.
Aldi allow receipt of free SMS overseas, but you have to enable it in your account settings I believe. Ensure you disable roaming data.
For me I put my Aldi SIM into a cheap ($30) Nokia phone which I only switched on when receiving an authorisation.
My main phone had the local, data only SIM
Thanks I will look into it on the Aldi site.
For me, only roaming will allow me getting 2FA codes.
So for example, when I was in SG the other day, even having local number wouldn't get me 2FAs but if I put back my AUS provider simcard but roaming activated, it works.
Using local WIFI doesn't work either
I'm with boost and as long as you've enabled messages over wifi you'll receive sms's to your number over the internet.
I travelled for 3 weeks with this and an esim enabled and received calls and messages from my Aus sim.
Don't you need the sim installed for the message over wifi to work? In which case why not just get them from roaming? Doesn't cost anything to receive SMS.
Boost also receives SMS messages for free over roaming, and doesn’t need Wifi to do so.
I personally tried to avoid text message as option if possible. Using Ubank recently on Mobile app only with fingerprint access doesn't trigger any verifications.
I used the card with pin, transfer money for Wise.
Some of the things I anticipated was Amazon, eBay which used to be text, I switched to authenticator app instead.
How long will you be overseas for? You could Port your Australian boost number to amaysim esim. $18 per month or $170 per year? YMMV- I haven’t tried this.
OP is with Catch.
But are you saying Amaysim will receive SMS without a roaming pack? I'm not sure how confident you are, but I really need to know 100%.
That is what has been confirmed below. And then you don’t need two phones. Just your esim from amaysim and your international physical sim.
Install the apps on your phone to try and avoid 2fa
Give a crappy phone to a friend with smstoemail app installed. Put it on silent, auto start, no vibrate etc. and disable battery management. Plug into power.
When you get an authentication sms it emails to you. If it fails, ask friend to restart the phone (take the phone code off)
It's risky, but thats what i do
Which "smstoemail" app's are you using or suggest, I notice there are a few out there for Android?
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.frzinapps.…
Just remember only sms, not notifications
Otherwise youll create this infinite loop
Turn on auto start, remove battery saver etc
Thanks Mate, this sounds Great :)
To further this, I have left SIM in old phone at home with Pushbullet installed. I can then receive txts via Pushbullet when on WiFi in another country but can also reply.
Did this some years back as bank would request a 1 or 2 answer to verify some credit card transactions. Did it again just recently, still worked fine except wasn't really necessary as only received verification codes and didn't need to reply so probably could have just brought my SIM as would have received the txts anyway.
What's your success rate been like? I was going to do similar, but my wife made me feel like a fool for considering it. (I was going to leave unattended at home, I guess the friend version would be a lot less risky than mine.)
the first time i did it, it stopped after a week. The problem was android had a security setting where it starts disabling high risk access if you dont use that feature.
Last time i went away for 3 weeks no issues
This is why I use Authy, and why I'll fight tooth-and-nail to avoid SMS 2FA - and not just because it's less secure than an app code generator. Still annoyed my bank disabled app 2FA and now exclusively uses SMS.
Yep same, I’m with NAB they are the worst for keeping up to date with the best security options.
NAB recently started sending some codes by push through their app, whereas usually they only do that by SMS for me. Might be a change for the better coming?
Oh no kidding I haven’t seen that yet. Let’s hope they actually roll it out by the end of the year and even then I doubt it.
ANZ had an app for this - but it's not available for at least the latest version of Android, with no idea of when it will be.
Borrow an old phone from someone
Im currently in singapore. On optus pre paid. Enable roaming before i left. Can recieve sms and phone calls for free. Perfect.
i use woolworths mobile.
dont need international roaming for SMS. I managed to receive SMS while in Japan, but you cannot reply.
I should ask Albo…he is overseas a lot.
Vodafone Pay & Go prepaid. You can get 365 days of credit for $40 (currently on sale at Coles until Tuesday for $15). Free to receive messages overseas but don’t make or receive any calls as that will burn all your credit in one hit. https://www.vodafone.com.au/prepaid/plans/pay-and-go
I spoke to my bank before I left & they turned off sms verification for the 2 weeks I was away. Simple as that.
Simple as that - just refer to your documented list of companies that use SMS authentication, and contact each to turn off SMS verification. For those that don't have that option, find a new business to deal with and get that setup. Make your you update your document. Simple as.
Short story, if you have network access, you should receive SMS without paying for roaming. If you need to reply, you need to add a roaming package.
Gave you a + because someone in that thread confirmed that amaysim will receive SMS without a roaming pack. Yah!
But I think your statement is quite a reach, I don't think that thread addresses every provider. Hope you're right though.
Yeah I don't see any confirmation of Vodafone there but would be strange if they're the only one not to.
I'd imagine all the unconfirmed Optus and Telstra MVNOs would be able to unless they've specifically disabled it.
Should add, you still need to enable roaming on your phone so can connect to overseas providers, but just make sure mobile data while roaming is disabled (probably fine anyway if your plan requires you to purchase a roaming pack)
If you're lucky might even be able to use WiFi calling (I think only Telstra based plans work overseas though)
Ah okay, I'm really glad the telcos are slowly becoming more affordable and reasonable. I just have trust issues :)
key is should. I tried it in USA with aldi mobile and couldnt get it to work
Yes it's a pain for me as my S20 doesn't have eSIM so if I'm expecting a 2FA code, I have to swap out my data SIM at my location and put the Coles SIM back in just to get the code
Change your MFA method from SMS to Microsoft or Google Authenticator. Many systems will give you the option to use that rather than SMS. All you need then is WIFI access.
Authenticator apps are not required to be online to work usually.
It depends if it authenticates. Microsoft applications using MFA do.
Can you open a Macquarie Account and plan to use just that while travelling? Macquarie have an authenticator app you can use in lieu of texts.
Woolworths mobile will receive SMS texts when overseas. Switch to them for your aussie number before you leave. My son also seems to receive calls sporadically as well (when on Wifi) despite not buying a roaming pack. I think this is voice over wifi working.
Buy an eSim for data when overseas. Depends on which countries you are going to for the best value. My son uses his eSim for outbound calls, SMS and data which is a lot cheaper than buying a roaming pack (Lyca mobile in the UK for him)
I’m on Woolworths Mobile too and as I don’t have dual SIMs I couldn’t get my Aussie number to work to receive SMS, I did something wrong I’m sure. In regards to eSIM while overseas don’t buy one just get the Eskimo one (I did it and used 500mb) and if you do need to buy a plan it lasts for 2 years, plus you can share data with others.
Just make sure you activate the international roaming service. I used pre-paid Amaysim in the past (physical SIM) and had to call the customer support to activate that service before leaving Australia. Also make sure that your Aussie banks can be accessed from overseas (some banks only allow you to login from Australia).
boost