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Stuck in the United States with no Service

Telususer1231
Just Moved In

Have you ever experienced the frustration of having your phone damaged while travelling abroad? I certainly have, and it's not a pleasant experience. Recently, while in the United States, my phone was damaged beyond repair, and I had to purchase a brand-new iPhone 14.

 

While I was relieved to have a new phone, my joy was short-lived when I discovered I couldn't get a working eSIM. I called Telus, my service provider, to get an eSIM, but they informed me that they could only ship a physical copy to my address in Canada. This left me in a difficult situation as I am still in the United States without service.

 

I am feeling frustrated and stuck, and I am wondering if anyone has any suggestions on how I can resolve this issue. Being without a phone is frustrating, especially when you're away from home and in a foreign country. If you have any ideas or solutions, please share them with me. I would greatly appreciate any help you can offer. I feel like Telus should have the ability to send me a QR code or something?

5 REPLIES 5

polecat
All-Star

@Telususer1231  You can get prepaid plans and sims in the us -----  the  cost  ---- long distance ---- would it work for you.   ????

Syaoran
All-Star
As a T-Mobile USA customer and Telus customer. Suspend your Telus service until you return and use a T-Mobile prepaid eSIM for now. They have plans that cover all of North America, even on orepaid, that are cheaper than the cheapest Telus plans for just Canada.

I spend 6 months of the year in the US and bought an s23 Ultea from T-Mobile that I received on Februaty 10th. It has the mmWave antenna that the Canadian version doesn't and with a few tweaks, supports all bands from all US and Canadian carriers, including the mmWave frewuencies Rogers and Bell will be deploying in a couple of years. For now, I am stuck carrying two phones unless I want to go back to my OnePlus 8T+ 5G that has been converted to dual-SIM and let my s23 Ultra sit in the box until I return to Canada because of the stupidity of acquiring a Telus eSIM.

JamesStewart
Organizer

A little late and not really a 'solution' per se, but if you know somebody in Canada that could pick-up an eSIM from a TELUS store, they could send you a copy/photo of it.  You could likely scan it from the copy/photo; provided, of course, the quality/resolution of it was sufficient.

 

With that said, offhand, I'm not sure if you can do the initial activation of that new eSIM while outside of Canada though.  Even if somebody were to send you a legible copy of a new eSIM, you may not be able to activate it on your device while in the US anyway.

Syaoran
All-Star
Customer Care mentioned if I had the QRCode, that I would need to contact Customer Care to activate it. I know US carriers have tools to see, reset, and activate SIM's in Canada and Mexico. I had to have a SIM replaced for my T-Mobile number in Canada years ago. T-Mobile was able to activate it while it was connected to Telus. I would hope Telus could do the same for someone in the US.