Staying In Touch In Bermuda

Telecommunications drive Bermuda's growth and prosperity

Phone Service

Although U.S. calling cards may not work on Bermuda, there are several possibilities for connecting internationally and locally.

Cable & Wireless, founded in 1890, is the grandfather of Bermuda's telecommunications companies and now offers International Direct Dialing to 200 countries, as well as digital and satellite systems.

A prepaid Bermuda phone card can be bought in many cafés, pharmacies and gas stations; these spots also offer SIM cards for GSM cell phones. Cable & Wireless offers international calling cards that you can use in Bermuda, the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and the Caribbean. For additional information, visit www.cwbda.com.

There are also prepaid cellular phones that can be ordered from the United States before the trip and that automatically zone in on the strongest signal wherever they are, such as Range Roamer's (www.rangeroamer.com).

On island, cell phones can be rented at numerous places, among them Bermuda Cell Rental (www.bermudacellrental.com, The Armoury Bldg., 37 Reid St., Hamilton, 232-2355), which offers cell phone rental for $2 per day, and DSL access using a PCMCIA modem card in a personal laptop for $20 per day, and Internet Lane (www.internetlane.net, The Walkway, 22 Reid St., Hamilton, 296-9972).

Laptop

For those who choose to equip their on-island office locally, Bermuda offers numerous possibilities, of which only two are: the iStore Bermuda (www.istorebermuda.com/iSite/iLearn.html), selling all things Apple, including numerous varieties of the Mac and the iPhone; and Bermuda Microsystems Group (www.bmg.bm), offering Dell notebooks equipped with Windows Vista.

Internet Access

Bermuda offers DSL and dial-up service (although dial-up, at 36 Kbps, is much slower than in the United States). Two of the high-speed companies are for businesses only, with international service and a business tax ID necessary to sign up: Cable & Wireless and TeleBermuda International. There are some four or five other major providers; AOL is not one of them, as any service providers must be 60 percent owned by a Bermudian. There has been some official talk of potentially doing away with the 60 percent rule for telecommunications, but so far this has not come to fruition. A group of local companies — North Rock Communications, Transact and KeyTech (Bermuda Telephone Company) — with the blessing of the local government is preparing to install an undersea cable connecting Bermuda and the United States. As a practical alternative to Cable & Wireless or TBI, however, this is still some ways off — 2010 is the speculative date.

Wi-Fi Hot Spots

Like all major technologically progressive areas, Bermuda has several Wi-Fi hot spots, primarily in local cafés and at the L.F. Wade International Airport in St. George's, where the British Airways executive lounges are all wired. The Bermuda Library on Queen Street offers free Internet service with a limit of 30 minutes per person.

A few additional options include:

• Caffé Latte — Bermuda, 8 York Street, St. George's
• The Fairmont Hamilton, 76 Pitts Bay Road, Hamilton
• The Fairmont Southampton, Hamilton 5, Southampton

Note: The Cable & Wireless earth station in Devonshire pictured here, was dismantled July 2007 as new technology made the dish obsolete.

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