Title: US Mobile cut my service while living abroad after telling me roaming would work indefinitely. Warning for expats
Posting this so other people living outside the US don't get caught the way I did.
When I signed up, I was told I could use my US Mobile line abroad on roaming with no time limit, as long as the line was activated in the US first. Based on that, I used it as my main US number from Brazil, including for bank and brokerage security codes.
Then, with no warning, my service was cut. Support told me I'd exceeded a 90-day roaming limit and needed to return to the US. That limit was never mentioned to me when I signed up. If it had been, I would have chosen a different carrier.
The real damage wasn't losing data. That number was the 2FA line for my financial accounts, and suddenly I couldn't receive codes. One brokerage wouldn't let me add a new number without a code sent to the old one, so I had to sort it out over the phone from abroad.
To be fair, they did offer a $3/month option to park the number so I don't lose it, and I'm using that until I can port it. But a parked number doesn't receive texts, so it doesn't fix the 2FA problem.
My takeaways if you live abroad:
- Get the roaming policy in writing before you sign up. Don't rely on what a sales or support rep says.
- Don't make a roaming line your only 2FA number for banks.
- Set up a backup sign-in method (authenticator app or security key) everywhere you can.
- Look for carriers that explicitly support Wi-Fi calling abroad for keeping a US number long term.
Has anyone else been cut off by US Mobile like this? Did you get the 90-day limit disclosed up front?
