A Great Resource for Those Moving to Buenos Aires

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Credit Cards

The next thing on the “To Do” list was to replace any of my credit cards that were expiring in the next year or so. This turned out to be incredibly easy. My American Express expires in 7 months, and after a quick call to customer service, they sent me a new card via overnight delivery (not that I even needed it that quickly). The same thing with my debit cards, although they were sent via normal postal mail. No problems whatsoever.

On foreign transactions, American Express charges the Interbank currency exchange rate as posted in the Walll Street Journal plus a 2% conversion fee. This will be something to keep in mind when making purchases.

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Postal Mail

By DaVe on in Planning, Tech

UPDATE (10/25/10): Please check out my newer post on mail forwarding services.

When I decided to make the move to Buenos Aires a few months ago, I also decided to start switching as many of my accounts to e-bills as I could. This resulted in an immediate reduction in the amount of mail I received (other than junk mail and catalogs). However, not everyone has an e-bill option yet and there are many other important things that may come via the postal mail too – tax notices, random checks, bills, etc. I needed to find a solution to deal with those.

Myfirst thought was to forward mail to my mother and ask her to open it for me, but I didn’t want to put that responsibility on her. Luckily, a quick Google search turned up an even better solution – Earth Class Mail. With Earth Class Mail, you sign up and then forward all of your mail to one of their addresses – a PO Box or an actual street address for a few bucks more. When they receive your postal mail, they scan in the envelope and then put it up on the web for you to view through a secure web site. When you login, you can view all your scanned mail and choose from the following options: open it and scan the contents, recycle it, shred it, archive it, or forward-ship it. You can even wait and batch all your mail into one shipment. The pricing is very reasonable too. I chose the $19.95/month plan which allows me to use one account for up to five different addresses (personal and business), and scans up to 100 mail pieces and 100 pages of mail per month.

The online setup is easy, but you will also need to mail them a notarized Form 1583, so make sure you give yourself enough time to do this. Your new postal address will then look something like this:

Your Name
PO BOX 55071 #12345
Boston, MA 02205-5071

Their security and privacy procedures are pretty strenuous too. And, this year they are adding electronic check deposit too! Definitely check them out for a great expat postal mail solution.

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Setting Up Telephone and Cell Phone Service

By DaVe on in Planning

Setting up phone service when you moved out of the country used to be a lot more complex. With the Internet and voice-over-ip services, everything is pretty simple.

Telephone: Vonage
I’ve had a Vonage phone number in the NYC (212) area code for almost four years now and it’s moved wherever I’ve gone. I’m keeping this number in Buenos Aires so that friends and family can contact me by dialing a US number, and I can make unlimited calls to the US, Canada and Puerto Rico. I signed up for a year of service in advance for $239.99 (about $20 per month). With Vonage, I can also add unlimited calling to a number of other countries including Argentina for $6/month. Unfortunately, this does not apply to cell phone numbers, which mostly operate on the calling party pays system. Calls to cell phones cost $.21/minute, so I won’t be forwarding my missed Vonage calls to my cell phone as I did in the US.

I’ve also read that a number of people have used Skype, so you may want to check that out. I’ve been a long time Vonage subscriber and have been happy with the service. If you decide to sign up for service, contact me for a referral and we’ll both get up to 2 months of free service.

Cell Phone: T-Mobile
I have read that electronics can be expensive and outdated in Argentina and the best thing to do is to bring your US cell phone with you (provided it is quad-band). Then, buy a pre-paid local SIM card to use in your existing phone. Since I have a Blackberry Pearl and have been pretty happy with it, that’s what I’m doing. The first thing I needed to do was call T-Mobile and get the unlock code for my phone. The unlock code is needed to allow your phone to work on a different network than the one where you purchased your phone. They were surprisingly helpful and told me that I would have the unlock code and instructions in an email within 24 hours. Sure enough, by the next morning I had the code and instructions for unlocking my phone.

Luckily, my T-mobile phone was out of contract, so there were no termination fees for me to pay. I was very attached to my (917) number though and wanted to keep it. I had three options:

Transfer it over to Vonage and tie it into my exisitng account as a virtual phone number for $4.99 per month
Transfer it over to Vonage as a new account or a second line on my existing account for $14.99 – $24.99 per month
Switch it with T-Mobile from a monthly account to a pre-paid account and only pay for what I used

I decided that Option 3 worked best for me. I could keep my number and also have a SIM card and phone to use when I take trips back to the US, plus there is no monthly fee to pay. I can also set my voicemail message to let people know what my Vonage number is if they want to reach me. Unfortunately, you cannot set up your pre-paid numbers to forward to your Vonage phone number as you can with a regular cell phone plan.

For some more reading, Wikipedia has a good article on telephone numbers in Argentina.

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