Do you wish to find out how to activate international roaming on MTN in South Africa? MTN is the second biggest network in the country. If you are on this network, a time may come when you need to visit another country. A lot of MTN customers are from Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique and elsewhere. These people often visit their home countries. How do they stay in touch while there? The answers lies in activating MTN roaming.
How to Enable MTN Roaming
The following is how to activate international roaming on MTN in South Africa;
- If you are an MTN prepaid customer, you can enable roaming by dialing the USSD code *135#. Follow the instructions that come up to complete the process.
- You can also enable MTN roaming using the MTN app.
- MTN contract customers need to walk into the nearest MTN store to have roaming activated. Alternatively, they can dial 135 on their phones. This allows them to talk to an MTN customer services representative.
Why activate international roaming on MTN?
That’s how to switch on international roaming on MTN in South Africa. But why would you do this? Well, with the holidays fast approaching, many people will be herding over to their home countries.
We have noted that there are millions of foreign nationals living and working in South Africa. On top of that, many South Africans will be going on holiday in other countries.
All these people can opt to turn on MTN international roaming. If you do this, you will be able to continue making and receiving calls on your number. That’s the major advantage of turning on roaming.
MTN roaming can be expensive
One thing that we have noted is that it’s great to activate roaming when you will only be gone for a few days. Maybe for a week or less.
However, if you are going to be staying in another country for a long time, activating MTN roaming becomes rather impractical. That’s because roaming tends to be very expensive.
It’s something that we have already noted when discussing Cell C roaming. The major challenge is that, in most cases, you will be paying both for making and receiving calls.
| Country | Operator | Local Calls | Calls to RSA | Int. Calls | Receiving Calls |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zimbabwe | Econet | R7.50 | R10.00 | R80.00 | R7.50 |
| NetOne | R10.00 | R15.00 | R20.00 | R7.50 | |
| Telecel | R10.00 | R15.00 | R20.00 | R7.50 |
Let’s take the example of Zimbabwe. The table above shows current MTN roaming rates for that country. As you can see, you pay R7.50 for receiving calls while roaming on Econet Wireless, which is Zimbabwe’s largest mobile network.
Just to put things into perspective, MTN offers the Pay Per Second plan where calls to any network are charged a flat R0.99 per minute. So, comparatively speaking, international roaming is quite expensive. If you are going to be staying in a country for long, you are better off getting a local SIM.
Summary
In this post, we showed you how to activate international roaming on MTN in South Africa. We noted that it can be done via USSD or using the App for prepaid customers.
Contract customers are required to walk into the nearest MTN store to get the issue sorted out. It was also stated that international roaming can be rather expensive, making it difficult to stay on roaming for long.
Post any followup questions on our forum. Also check out our post on MTN contract requirements for South Africa.