[clug-talk] Cell phones and Telus

[Shawn]

Also, there is the site http://www.cellphones.ca/ where you can compare 
plans of the different providers.

Shawn

Martin Glazer wrote:
> Seeing we are discussing cell phones in Canada, have people read the 
> recent article about how the gov killed the cellphone cost calculator? 
> If you are interested - http://thestar.com/article/688547
> 
> 
> Martin
> 
> Shawn wrote:
>> There was a recent discussion on cell providers on SlashDot.  The 
>> bottom line is that in Canada, they all suck - compared to the 
>> services available outside North America.  There are horror stories 
>> for every provider, and I personally have mine with Bell.
>>
>> I shifted from Bell to Rogers for two reasons.
>> First was my calls were getting dropped on a regular basis.  This was 
>> a newer phone and I would see calls dropped regularly (3 to 5 times a 
>> month).  When I called them on it, they would tell me their "records" 
>> only showed 3 dropped calls in the year.  When a business call 
>> possibly worth a lot of money was dropped, that was the last straw in 
>> this case. BTW, the majority of the dropped calls happened within 
>> Calgary, and it didn't matter if I was stationary or mobile (i.e. 
>> driving).
>>
>> The second reason is more mundane.  I had bought the OpenMoko phone to 
>> play with.  It was GSM based, and the only GSM provider at that time 
>> (still?) was Rogers.  So I paid $25 for the sim, signed up on a one 
>> year contract (they wouldn't just sell me the SIM without a contract, 
>> so took the smallest I could).  Turns out the OpenMoko's phone 
>> capabilities are somewhat lacking (volume issues mostly) so I paid 
>> full price for another phone and dropped in the same SIM with no 
>> problems.
>>
>> This ability to swap SIM cards on the fly is a very convenient 
>> feature.  Apparently the rest of the world has adopted GSM, and Canada 
>> is one of the last hold-outs for CDMA phones.  So, if you want to be 
>> able to travel, I think you'll have more flexibility with a GSM based 
>> phone - which means Rogers or one of it's child companies.
>>
>> In terms of pricing and service, I'm not particularly happy with 
>> Rogers.  I seem to be paying double what my plan is supposed to be - 
>> my minute usage is a little more than the plan at $0.30/minute.  I've 
>> changed plans, but need to wait a month or two for things to settle 
>> down to the new price structure.  I also am getting a lot of dropped 
>> calls. Especially since coming back from Vegas.  But, I'm reasonably 
>> sure this is a case of me dropping my phone toooooo many times.  (New 
>> phone in the near future for me...)
>>
>> HTH
>>
>> Shawn
>>
>> Dick Angus wrote:
>>> Thanks for the quick responses. That was a lot of good information. I 
>>> do need some out-of-Canada service so 711 looks to be out. Knowing 
>>> that many of the others are off-shoots of Bell (I worked for them 
>>> many decades ago - a fresh young programmer just out of school) I 
>>> might give them a good look. Maybe their Solo service will work well 
>>> for us.
>>
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