OK I did try doing a search before posting but was unable to find a clear answer. I am currently studying Chinese and I have a Record of ID from the immigration department. Is there any cell phone providers that will let you sign up for a phone with the Record of ID? I need to have my own phone before I get my ARC card. I do have a co-signer if needed.
Thanks so much for your help.
[quote=“scottyfl813”]OK I did try doing a search before posting but was unable to find a clear answer. I am currently studying Chinese and I have a Record of ID from the immigration department. Is there any cell phone providers that will let you sign up for a phone with the Record of ID? I need to have my own phone before I get my ARC card. I do have a co-signer if needed.
Thanks so much for your help.[/quote]
FarEasTone will do it if you give them a deposit. And not just prepay either, you can even get a subscription.
[quote=“KingZog”][quote=“scottyfl813”]OK I did try doing a search before posting but was unable to find a clear answer. I am currently studying Chinese and I have a Record of ID from the immigration department. Is there any cell phone providers that will let you sign up for a phone with the Record of ID? I need to have my own phone before I get my ARC card. I do have a co-signer if needed.
Thanks so much for your help.[/quote]
FarEasTone will do it if you give them a deposit. And not just prepay either, you can even get a subscription.[/quote]
Are you sure? The OP doesn’t have an ARC, just a student visa. To my knowledge, you need at least an ARC to qualify.
marboulette
FarEast Tone will not allow me to apply unless I have the actual ARC card. I just have the student Visa and the Record of ID.
I’m trying to figure out if it is possible to get a new phone with a plan without an ARC. I read on Tealit that you can but no where seems to do it and nobody is talking about it. Do all the illegal teachers get pre-paid? Surely somewhere must do this, I want a plan so I can get a data phone with internet. If anyone has some advice for me I’d be very grateful as I haven’t found any help so far. Thanks.
Hey Dragonbones, I understand the need to not duplicate questions and responses about topics but the previous posts are too old to help. I need to know about data phones, they weren’t as plentiful even two years ago and i’m pretty sure the rules regarding phone plans in Taiwan have changed since then. I need info from today’s standpoint, technology moves too quickly. I need someone who’s been in my position in the last two months not the last two to four years.
That’s fine – hopefully someone can come along and provide you fresher info. 
rugged rob,
don’t take it too hard from these guys. they’ve been here for a while and either forgot what it was like trying to get a phone plan when first getting here or got here at a time before there were things called data plans and smartphones.
i put a summary post of recent experiences and options here. this is from my own experience and experience from on-boarding folks while their ARCs were getting processed.
in short, your best bet is to either suck it up on pre-paid voice and SMS plus wifi for data until you get your ARC or find a relative or really close friend to get the contract for you. in most cases if you also get a phone with the contract, you will have to pre-pay for roughly 14 months of service on a 24-month plan.
Thanks mabagal. I guess I was just getting frustrated but your response helped me out a lot. Appreciate it muchly.
You should check out Vibo. With a passport and international licence (in theory, other secondary ID will work, but perhaps not) you should be able to do prepaid (which has decent data if I remember correct) and even a plan (I think).
I was going to do the above, but ended up going through a friend for a cell. It may or may not be correct, but worth a shot if you haven’t checked it out yet.
If you have Record Id and passport, you can keep on trying going to different mobile shops as some of them will accept your Record ID and passport (2 of my friends got it)
I got a 3G phone+data plan about 6-8 months ago just with my passport and UK driving licence. Didnt need any record ID. Its billed to a non-Taiwan credit card as I dont have a local bank account or card. I did have to leave a deposit though (I cant remember exactly how much…it may have been around $2500 NTD or possibly a bit more). If your chinese isn’t great then it’s helpful if you can go with a local friend who can help make sure they understand exactly what you want. It’s also better to go to the main offices of the phone companies, rather than the small ‘hole in the wall’ branches (many of the smaller shops are just franchises, so they may not know the nitty-gritty of getting phone service for a non-resident, and will insist you need an ARC etc).
Also, it’s worth going to shops in areas with lots of foreign visitors as they’re more used to dealing with these issues. I used the big Far Eastern Telecom (遠傳) shop at the back of the Mitsukoshi which is opposite Taipei Station.
I originally had a prepay plan (no 3G) from a few years before, and this summer I converted it to a normal monthly 3G plan (with unlimited data and micro-SIM) because I wanted to keep the number. In fact, they also “gave” me a “free” phone as part of the deal (well, they billed me for it, but then I get a big discount every month on the plan charge, which eventually covers the cost of the phone). This was before the iphone was launched in Taiwan. They have iphone plans now, if you want that.
As far as I could tell, the process and requirements for starting a plan from scratch is going to be much the same, and might even be slightly simpler than the transfer that I did.
The key is, as is often the case in Taiwan, you just need to find the right person who wants to help get your problem solved. Some of the shop staff take it as a challenge to get you up and running, and you can see that they enjoy working around the system to get you setup. Others either cant be bothered, or just assume that, if there isn’t an explicit rule allowing something, then it cant be done. So, if you get a negative response, its worth trying again with someone else.
Good luck!
Ben
I lucked out on a bad employee at 台北大哥大。I like to think that he thought that I was cute and just bent the rules for me. He called for the documents later, but I said that they were processing. I’ll have to return with them later.
Yes I know this topic has been covered many times in this forum. I’ve used the search feature and haven’t come up with much to help me in the current outlook of cell phones. I will be coming to Taipei at the end of March and want to ensure that I can have a cell phone while I am there that will be capable of everything that I want it to do. Basically I will only be in Taipei for 3 months. I am looking for an unlimited data plan with unlimited text messaging. I don’t know from the research if this is capable without an ARC card. I would even be willing to pay for everything up front for the 3 months that I need rather than having to pay as I go and keep getting refills. Is this possible at all?
Also I am looking at getting a new phone before I head over that will be easier to unlock for international use on another carrier(iPhone not that friendly). I was reading that most of the island is covered by 3g and want to make sure if I get a 3g Android phone that it will be able to work seamlessly while I am there. Any up to date information will be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
~e
I had an easier time getting a 2 year contract postpaid phone than I did getting a SIM card at 7-11, but I do have an ARC. The 7-11 problem was that I don’t have a landline. They did however require all kinds of paperwork and they fax it somewhere and you have to wait 12-24 hours to get it activated. I think I eventually just made up a landline or gave them my work #. Maybe find a local and have them buy the prepaid SIM for you. I wouldn’t call anything regarding a cell phone seamless, but I find 3G coverage to be quite good in Taiwan though I haven’t spent much time in the central mountains.
Is there any other advice? What would be the best service if I had to go prepaid? And is it best to find it before I leave the airport?
As far as I have been able to find, there are NO unlimited anything plans in Taiwan. The market is both more and less mature than in the US.
Note that the advent of huge volumes of data traffic has caused the American vendors to drop their unlimited anything plans too.
Pay as you go is the way it is. Forced by the very few users who were grabbing most of the data capacity.
[quote=“Joschka”]As far as I have been able to find, there are NO unlimited anything plans in Taiwan. The market is both more and less mature than in the US.
Note that the advent of huge volumes of data traffic has caused the American vendors to drop their unlimited anything plans too.
Pay as you go is the way it is. Forced by the very few users who were grabbing most of the data capacity.[/quote]
There’s unlimited plans with contract but not sure about prepaid. I pay NT$850/month with CHT for unlimited data and with a phone running Android 2.2, a colleague was able to wirelessly get online with his laptop through it when we were working on the east coast a couple of weeks ago. Didn’t cost me anything extra.
[quote=“Joschka”]As far as I have been able to find, there are NO unlimited anything plans in Taiwan. The market is both more and less mature than in the US.
Note that the advent of huge volumes of data traffic has caused the American vendors to drop their unlimited anything plans too.
Pay as you go is the way it is. Forced by the very few users who were grabbing most of the data capacity.[/quote]
台灣大哥大 (MyFone) has unlimited pre-paid, tetherable data for ~350NT/5 days with just a passport and another government-issued ID. I always recommend this to friends who visit with iPhones or Androids and it’s always worked fine. It’s a bit steep compared to their 850NT/month post-paid contract plan, but in the grand scheme of things 2100NT/month is pretty good for unlimited data prepaid or not.
Setting this up with a few hundred extra NT for voice calls and SMS should be a totally workable solution. Because with an unlimited data plan, calling and SMS usage will go down a bunch. If you have unlimited data, and set up your phone with Skype/Viber/What’s App/Kik/etc., you have pretty close to unlimited everything with some caveats, but nonetheless workable.
I think 中華電信 (Senao) has something similar.
Things will get interesting depending on how this promised 100% coverage, 100% free WiFi in Taipei works out later this spring.