For the globetrotter who constantly need data on the go, Maxis has announced its Bridge DataRoam Unlimited which gives you data roaming at a fixed daily rate from RM33/day in India (Aircel), Thailand (AIS), Hong Kong (CSL), Macau (CTM), Philippines (Globe), Australia (Optus), Singapore (SingTel), South Korea (SK Telecom), Taiwan (Taiwan Mobile) and Indonesia (Telkomsel).
From the table above, it costs RM33/day for the 1 day plan and it can be as low as RM26.60/day if you choose the 5 day pass at RM133. If we had it our way, we would suggest a cheaper alternative of using a local prepaid SIM with 3G internet service. However Data Roaming could be a better choice to avoid the hassle of looking for local prepaids especially in countries where the locals can’t really understand your language.
DiGi offers something similar at RM36/day on its DG Smart Plan but it is limited to Australia (Telstra), Hong Kong (Peoples), Indonesia (Indosat), Philippines (SMART), Singapore (Starhub) and Thailand (Dtac). Celcom in the other hand has introduced similar daily data roaming packages for telcos under its Celcom Axiata umbrella in Sri Lanka (Dialog), Indonesia (XL), Bangladesh (Robi) and Cambodia (Hello) at RM38/day.
Compared to its rivals, Maxis offering is cheaper and its cost per day can be lowered if you opt for 3-5 days Plans. Maxis too covers more countries including South Korea, Taiwan and India. To activate, just call 123 or dial *100# and select your plans under Services > International Roaming. There’s no mention of the download speeds and we wonder if a single 5 day plan can support multiple countries. We will try to find out on that.
For more information, head to Maxis’s DataRoam page.
