Cell telephone service in Canada? - RV-Dreams Community Forum

Country Dancer · RV-Dreams Family Member

Cell telephone service in Canada?

lmcallis · RV-Dreams Family Member

While this may not help you, Verizon has a US + Canada voice plan. Adding Canada (both incoming and outgoing calls) to your existing plan costs an additional $20/month. You have to call Verizon to get it as it's not available on line. Perhaps, to be competitive, ATT has a similar plan. You're correct, without something like this, voice roaming in Canada is expensive.

Good Luck

adeline and ed · RV-Dreams Family Member

When we visit the U.S. ,we have the same problem with fees. What we did was buy a trac phone, and also use a Magic Jack phone

Country Dancer · RV-Dreams Family Member

Thanks you guys. We've looked into the "Speak Out" phones that 7-11 sells in Canada, which may be like the trac phones you mention. But their website says that only Canadian residents can buy them. Does anyone know anything or have experience with those phones?

ATT does have a similar plan, that only costs 4.99 a month, but then charges .60 per minute for phone calls above that. Not ideal.

Gary · RV-Dreams Family Member

I'm in Canada for the next 3 months and ended up going with Virgin Mobile's pay as you go plan. Went into a store, got the phone and buy cards to recharge it.

I'm with Verizon but couldn't get a straight answer at the store about the plans. They wanted to change my whole plan up.

The store manager was honest though. He said he didn't understand the plan, called in, talked to someone, had it on speaker so I could listen in. He still didn't get it after the conversation and recommended I get what I did.

Bill and Linda · RV-Dreams Family Member

lmcallis wrote:
While this may not help you, Verizon has a US + Canada voice plan. Adding Canada (both incoming and outgoing calls) to your existing plan costs an additional $20/month. You have to call Verizon to get it as it's not available on line. Perhaps, to be competitive, ATT has a similar plan. You're correct, without something like this, voice roaming in Canada is expensive.
Good Luck

100% Correct as pertains to the Verizon deal – but there is a bit more. If you have “internet” / data service on your phone, like an iPhone, make 100% sure you turn the 3G/4G data service off before you get close (like 50 miles is our rule) to Canada. The data charges, as the CSRs will tell you, are very very high. Your phone could “hit” a Canadian tower just once and you will have a large bill even if you never made a specific request to the internet.

Just a little info to save you a lot of money in case you didn’t know.

Bill

RVPAINTER · RV-Dreams Family Member

We just called Verizon 2 days ago and got the $20 Canada add on as we will be in Canada for 2 months starting 6/27. We did stop our Verizon "HOT SPOT" as that is very, very expensive to add Canada! So the expense is pretty much a wash.

blijil · RV-Dreams Family Member

Old technology sometimes works best. We used an international phone card purchased in Canada to check our cell phone messages after notifying our contacts that the cell phone was off but we would check messages daily and call back with our phone line if necessary or email if we were at a hotspot. We found hotspots/wifi where there was no cell coverage anyway but always found a land line. It was cheap <$20 for a nightly check and effective receiving a few important calls but not really that many and chatting on our own schedule and dime.

Larry

Country Dancer · RV-Dreams Family Member

Thanks again all. We don't have Verizon, so I'm looking for ATT info. Thanks for suggesting the phone card. That sounds pretty reasonable. Anyone have any info about the 7-11 phone? Can US residents use it?

hpykmpr47 · RV-Dreams Community Member

We spent the summer in Nova Scotia last year and before we left on the trip we started up the Verizon Canada plan for 20 dollars a month and it was great. I think ATT also offer the same plan unless their plans have changed ....Alan

dewwood · RV-Dreams Family Member

We have Google Voice on our iphones and use it to make calls to and from Canada. They are free for the US & Canada and very low rates for other international calling. There are a lot of other features included. This is a link that should take you to their website: https://support.google.com/voice/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=115061&topic=1707989&rd=1

We have relatives in Canada and the AT&T rates on our cells phone, which are our only phones, was outrageous. You still use your regular iphone you just download the app to it. There are also apps for other types of phones. It has worked well for us.

Edit by moderator: Activated link. Terry

-- Edited by Terry and Jo on Sunday 17th of March 2013 01:57:27 PM

rascal55 · RV-Dreams Community Member

If you have a smart phone that uses Sim Cards, you might try buying a sim card in Canada and getting a pay and talk plan. I live in Manitoba Canada and plan on doing this when we travel in the US. This would be the same as getting a disposable phone. Our Cell phone plans in Canada are more expensive than those in the Us.