“In the U.S., the AT&T iPhone plan offers 450 anytime minutes (unused minutes can be rolled over to the next month), 5000 additional night and weekend minutes, and unlimited data for $59.99. If/when the iPhone makes its way to Canada, Rogers will be the sole carrier given the absence of any competition for GSM services (unless Apple decides to wait for a much-needed fourth carrier following a set-aside for the 2008 spectrum auction, but that is a long time to wait without a guarantee of a set-aside),” Michael Geist blogs.
A comparable plan for Rogers today costs:
• 500 minutes (Canada-wide, no rollover) – $60
• 500 additional evening and weekend minutes – $25
• 500 MB of data (no unlimited data offered) – $210
Geist explains, “In other words, a plan from Rogers (Rogers plan in C$, AT&T in US$ but currencies now nearly at par) that offers less than AT&T – the Canadian version does not have unlimited data, does not offer rolled over minutes, and has only 10 percent of the night and weekend minutes – currently runs $295 per month.”
Full article here.
$295/month would be some Strange Brew, indeed. Apple would never let such a thing happen, eh?
I guess it is time for Rogers to stop being a crook!
Not only that. Go to Rogers website and look at their coverage maps. Western Canada is particularly pathetic.
http://www.shoprogers.com/store/wireless/coverage/info.asp
As a westerner, this is more than a little annoying. Anecdotally, everyone I’ve ever met that has used Rogers hates their service, their (lack of) coverage, and their attitude.
A Telus guy I was talking to yesterday thinks that their cable TV and Video Rental stores keep their wireless operation afloat.
My opinion is that Apple might be better off waiting for the spectrum auction, and set up their own wireless company or something. Rogers in Canada has a far worse reputation than AT&T does in the States.
MDN word: income – as in my income couldn’t support that kind of cost for an iPhone!
WOW
and I thought I was getting f**ked by Telmex here in Mexico
probably be a lot cheaper, buying in the states, and get the roaming charge’s
I can’t stand Rogers. They wouldn’t know customer service if it bit them in the ass. Moreover, the wireless offerings in Canada have always been lacklustre. If Apple started/endorsed a new wireless service, after wiping the tears from my eyes, I’d switch.
Better not even be close to that. It would be criminal.
This Canuck says that sucks royally.
There’s not much point in releasing the iPhone in Canada if you have to pay that much per month just to use it.
Rogers are and have always been crooks.
Piss on them.
PS. Telus in Canada does have 1 GSM phone in their line up. True stuff.
For those who don’t know Rogers, in Canada, we call them Robbers.
Man, I dislike them… Still, if they get the iPhones, I will switch over. Sigh.
You know, moved to Canada, from NYC in ’77. AT that time Canada was heralded as a kind-of wunderkid of communications… Today (in Toronto) I sometimes feel like we’re 3rd class cellular-citizens.
Please don’t get me started about Rogers either.
Jb
Well, if that’s the state of wireless affairs in Canada, then they’ll just skip Canada this time around and focus on Europe, Asia and perhaps Latin America.
Better luck next time, Canada!
Should be Robers instead of Rogers.
That’s a bit steep, eh?
Most telecoms are corrupt. Most mobile phone users are stupid. It’s a perfect match.
I use Rogers (they were the only ones that had the SLVR), and the rest of my family uses Telus right now.
I can tell you… THEY BOTH SUCK!
I’m not sure if it’s the phone, but living in western Canada (Edmonton and area), I seem to get better reception than my family. But I just paid my bill the other day, and it’s still over $50 for basic phone + voicemail. I don’t know how much that would be in the states, but it’s still ridiculous here.
So the rule of thumb up here is not to go with the *best* wireless carrier. It’s to go with the one that sucks the *least*. Canada better start getting its ass in gear.
Won’t fly. Roger’s does have a very bad reputation and poor coverage in much of the country. They also were in the centre of the negative billing fiasco. (“You owe us money because you never said you didn’t.”)
Apple’s better off waiting, being part of a new carrier, or not having an exclusive deal in Canada.
However, Apple does seem to think Toronto and Canada are the same thing, so they’ll probably go exclusive with Rogers. Unless someone can convince Rogers to announce an exclusive deal before Apple does, thus pissing off his Steveness.
More than likely, since Canada leans left, the government is probally tied in with the phone services, with layer after layer of regulation as to price, service, forced medical insurence, unions and other Marxist mandates.
As soon as a people vote based on what they will get from government at other people’s expense, this is what they get, and it comes from every area of the economy. Maybe Canadians ought to have the government make their cell phones.
“More than likely, since Canada leans left, the government is probally tied in with the phone services, with layer after layer of regulation as to price, service, forced medical insurence, unions and other Marxist mandates. “
Yes of course. You’re exactly right. Totally.
o.O
It is better to remain silent and let people think you a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.
I know Rogers has banged me a few times with roaming charges on both coasts of Canada but $50 Cdn for basic wireless plus voice mail with 500 minutes included sounds about right. Down here it seems every count in ever state has their hand in the tax pie to pay for 911 emergency services so a $45 per mont bill ends up at $60 before overage charges and text msgs and other extras.
In the 1980’s, the U.S., under Regan, de-regulated the telephone indrustry. Back then, I called Germany quite a bit, usually 30 minutes per day, plus other U.S. calls. My phone bills were about $1200 per month. Today, with the phone cos. no longer a “public utility” the same calls would cost about $125 a month. That $1200 per month in today’s dollars is about $2500. Deregulation in this case reduced phone bills about 90%.
My question is if RIM can survive in Canada, why not Apple’s iPhone? Just asking the obvious question here. Surely Apple would negotiate with Rogers, which company would be severely embarrassed if their rates turn out to be several times the rates in the U.S. and everybody finds that out.
No doubt, Dion. What people think they get for free from the gov’t increases the costs of services provided by private companies every time. I don’t know the specifics in the telco situation in Canada, but no doubt they set up artificial barriers to entry and have their sweetheart deals just like other governments around the world do. (Amazing how the leftists here categorically deny that such things can happen, but it’s easy being an ostrich.)
I live up here in canada and was with Rogers for 2 years and I hated it. Now I am with Bell mobility and I am loving it. I have a $30 a month phone bill and even with sms and taxes my phone bill is only ever $35-$40 a month
[Rogers in Canada has a far worse reputation than AT&T does in the States.]
MrMikey is right. However, there is Fido. (Yeah I know, not really
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Anyway, Fido is a recently acquired ‘affiliate’ of Rogers. Fido is how Rogers got GSM. However, since the acquisition Fido’s customer service has become worse than the fair that it was.
So, to recap our position – we have:
a) Bell; Telus; et al.; on sh!tty CDMA but with better customer service and rates
b) Rogers/Fido with GSM and sh!tty customer service and real sh!tty rates.
Downloaded a 45KB Java applet file to my Fido/Nokia phone. But, the applet wouldn’t actually work — it exceeded the 45KB applet size limit of the handset. Arrrgh! 45 doesn’t equal 45. Still got charged the $1.35 though. Quality.
The $210/500MB seems cheap compared to the current 3¢ per kilobyte! [that’s $30.72 per 1 MB or $15,360 per 500 MB] You won’t have a house, but you’ll have a bitchin’ phone.
One of 3 things will happen:
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1) Apple will persuade Rogers to actually compete.
2) Rogers will fsck-up iPhone in Canada
3) Apple will wait for spectrum — or buy Fido
Take off, you hosers!
“My question is if RIM can survive in Canada, why not Apple’s iPhone? Just asking the obvious question here. Surely Apple would negotiate with Rogers, which company would be severely embarrassed if their rates turn out to be several times the rates in the U.S. and everybody finds that out.”
Since RIM is a Canadian company, could this be a protective measure to favor a Canuck company?
One slim possibility is Telus’ “Mike,” which I think may actually be GSM. Very slim, though.
… is from BC.
Where is Johnny Canuck from?
Someone sits at his desk, adds up the present costs of different services, decides which company Apple will go with (I assume because Rogers is affiliated with AT&T), and voila! comes up with how much it is going to cost Canadians a month for the iPhone.
I wonder when Steve Jobs will be informed of this done deal? He’s just waiting eagerly for this information before rushing off to Ottawa to launch the iPhone in Canada!
That’s why I’m glad as hell the iPhone has Wifi! I have Nokia E61 with WiFi right now. Other than checking email occasionally using GPRS data, I won’t bother trying to surf the web unless I have access to a Wifi hotspot.
But I pay $25/month for 400 weekday minutes and unlimited evenings/weekends including voicemail, call display and call waiting. It’s a group discounted plan, I think regular price is about $35/month. Sure, not exactly the same as the AT&T plan, but not too far off. Data of course is another matter altogether. I think I pay about $5 extra for 10MB of data and 200 sms messages. I’d pay up to $30/month for unlimited data and sms if they offered it.
Rogers coverage and reception is excellent in Ontario and Quebec.
I switched to Roger’s from Bell and previously from Telus about two years ago. Their rate plans are competitive with the others up here and their coverage good and bad depending on where you are (just like all the others.)
Give the wireless companies in Canada a bit of a break. Canada is the second largest country in the world and our whole population is less than New York State. And our land-line infrastructure is pretty amazing considering the above, unlike the other side of the world where they are leap-frogging to wireless.
BustingTheSkullsOfIdiots: People don’t educate themselves. That is a big problem. I refer them ot two Nobel Prize winning economists: Milton Freedman and Friedrich Hayek.
All of the Free Market Deniers ought to move to Canada and get their heads examined, that is after they get on a six-month waiting list.
Rogers will tell you its expensive to operate a sparsely populated network. No one is rocking the boat ’cause high tide (prices) lifts all boats (corporate profits). Telus, Bell, Rogers are criminal in their charges to customers.
We would love for Apple to become a Telco in Canuck land. At least they would make you enjoy the experience.
When you think of Telco’s lacking innovation you can start here. My 283 minute bill was $111.96 on Bell last month. Long Distance charges – $1.20 That averages $.39 cpm all charges and fees in.
Who freed Milton? Why were we not informed?
Is this a fact? or is it rumuor…..
@ Abdullah,
2% Camel’s Milk is not Camel’s Milk, It is Camel Milk Flavoured Water! I don’t do that…..
Your Glass of Cold Camel’s Milk has been revoked!!!
Wait a second. I thought only American companies could be complete bastards. What, no socialized wireless plans ? How barbaric. Oh, right people will wait two years for a hip replacement but not a cell phone. Why, it smacks of capitalism!
And government deregulation of energy companies has worked so well in the States.
MDN word: growing
My electric bill keeps growing and growing and growing.
@Camel’s Milk Drinker
Sheesh! All I wanted was to take the camel out of the milk, you Free Market Denier! I prefer my Camels powdered.
no iphone, BUT we do have health-care and gun-control
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Johnny Canuck is from Lotus Land.
I currently own a Roger’s phone and they charge me 5¢ per kilobyte to browse – needless to say I never use the internet as it is way too expensive. As a Canadian this is one unfortunate reality I’ll have to consider before buying an iPhone. Roger’s Wireless is a very greedy bloodsucker and they just may charge so much for usage that the iPhone would essentially be useless unless they upgrade it and add iChat via WiFi. Apple has no say in Canada and our CRTC (like the FCC in the US) is the main culprit that allows them to operate non-competitively as monopolies so they can charge whatever outlandish prices they want.
Rogers prices do indeed suck, but so do all of the “first tier” Canadian offerings – Bell, Telus, Rogers. And I’ve heard horror stories on all of them regarding customer ‘service’.
You need to look into the “mass market” plans, – Solo, especially (GSM based, Rogers purchased) Fido.
I have nationwide, unlimited Fido to Fido, unlimited evenings and weekends, 150 daytime minutes (because that’s all I use – I can get more if I pay more) for $30/month. Every time I’ve phoned them for customer service, I’ve been happy, amazingly.
Yes, Fido’s rollover was discontinued before Rogers bought them, which sucks.
Data in general sucks badly but the (now discontinued) hiptop – another highly data intensive device was only $20/month unlimited data at Fido. Solo (Bell’s mass market brand) also has unlimited data but a sucky phone selection, last I checked.
So, it depends on the phone, brand and plan – do your homework.
Now if Rogers only gives the iPhone to its Rogers brand, Steve will insist they import Fido/AT&T style pricing, I’m sure. In a showdown, I know who I’ll bet on…
Also check the blackberry rates – cheaper data, again, depending on the carrier.
I just love the negative B.S. on the iPhone – the iPhone is so good, the B.S. is really easy to spot. Almost as easy to spot as Universal Health Care B.S….
Say, I’ve got a great idea – privatized Fire Departments – with deluxe and entry level plans (choice is good, after all), such that the total bill is double, and 20% won’t be serviced at all…
(couldn’t resist)
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The service plan rates for iPhone from AT&T were also going to be sky-high… until it wasn’t. Just more FUD.
easy fix, CDMA version of the phone. no biggy, Palm and RIM have GSM and CDMA versions. come on Apple, make what the people want.
@Jonny Canuck:
I’m a Fido customer. As soon as Rogers took over, 2 things happened: Customer service deteriorated, but coverage improved.
I don’t know how long Fido will continue to exist as a subsidiary, as it is likely to be totally absorbed by Rogers. However, should Apple decide to go to Fido (unlikely), things might change. It’s a message to Rogers that says: “That part of your company we like, the rest sucks”.
I think Apple would be better off forming their own subsidiary MNVO (Mobile Network Vertual Operator), renting spectrum from Rogers, Bell or Telus. Apple would then teach us what a mobile company should be like, just as Apple is teaching us what a phone should be like.
correction of MDN:
$295/month would be some Strange Brew, eh? Apple would never let such a thing happen.
I dunno very well about all those networks but Bell does offer gsm too and they will have much more gsm phones in the end of the year. Also, a Bell Mobility supervisor told me today that there’s rumors about a Bell iPhone (or nano iPhone ??). So, maybe we’ll be surprise…
“I dunno very well about all those networks but Bell does offer gsm too and they will have much more gsm phones in the end of the year. Also, a Bell Mobility supervisor told me today that there’s rumors about a Bell iPhone (or nano iPhone ??). So, maybe we’ll be surprise.
huh? I don’t see any mention of GSM in the link.
Supporting GSM (the iPhone digital standard, so far) and CDMA (the other digital standard, the one Bell uses) would mean massive costs, so this seems unlikely.
Now another possibility is that Apple will bring out a CDMA phone for Japan (where GSM isn’t used) and sell that to Bell, if Rogers doesn’t play ball. It will be a 3g iPhone, also, surely (Japan has an advanced 3g network), which will ease the pain of being forced to wait.
Only problem is that 3g in Canada is even worse than in the U.S. It would send a wakeup call to AT&T on their crappy network tho.
Well, the link wasn’t correct: Bell already offer a gsm able phone and have agreements with some partners for this kind of network.
niclet:
Indeed, Bell is offering a GSM phone, as the link shows.
The magic is revealed further down the page: the Moto A840 supports both CDMA and GSM – the magic is in the phone, not Bell’s network – Bell, almost certainly, is still CDMA only, for cost reasons. Good trick tho!
This is a good feature to ask for in Apple’s next iPhone – this way Apple can service the entire world with a single iPhone, at the hardware level. The magic is probably done in the chipset, so the phone cost/complexity shouldn’t increase that much.
@niclet,
‘Sure Am Relieved’ is correct. In fact, their Blackberry program also offers a handset that combines CDMA and GSM capabilities.
This would be the perfect feature for the iPhone. It would make it both locked and unlocked simultaneously:
1- CDMA locked to Bell for example (best coverage and fastest data in Canada)
2- GSM unlocked, perfect for travellors who could then use it on other networks. Or, for that matter, use it on Rogers’ GSM network!
Given that the Blackberry is a Canadian inventor/owner, what are the odds that the federal Canadian agencies are deliberately dragging their feet to support something like the outrageous Rogers’ cost outlined above?
Bell is CDMA, I know, I work there. The GSM phone your talking about is the “Worldphone”, which is CDMA and GSM so you can use your phone where CDMA isn’t availible.
“Given that the Blackberry is a Canadian inventor/owner, what are the odds that the federal Canadian agencies are deliberately dragging their feet to support something like the outrageous Rogers’ cost outlined above?”
While nothing is impossible, the fact that it is now illegal to bribe Canadian politicians (campaign finance “donations” from corporations, organizations, unions banned) would seem to significantly reduce the odds.
On the other hand, stranger things have happened to “protect” jobs. I can’t see Rogers getting a deal while Bell/Telus goes hungry tho.
Part of the problem seems to be fat and lazy cellular vendors. Since several smaller entrants (Clearnet, Fido (especially)) got gobbled up the situation got worse.
OTOH, there are only 3 huge cellular companies in the U.S. – odd that they seem to remember how to compete, yet the Canadian big 3 don’t, if U.S. prices/features/speed are any guide.
Standardizing on GSM (Europe) helped there, making it a national priority (government buildout) helped in S. Korea, Japan where 4g is widely used (4g = broadband speeds over cellular = the cell company is the ISP)
Standardize on GSM? CDMA is far more scalable.
Troy:
1. Europe standardized on GSM a long time ago. This makes it vastly easier to switch carriers since you know your phone will work with the new guy, ignoring locking.
In other words, the government picked the standard, and the cellular market got a nice boost, rather than wait until the market sorted things out/have multiple standards.
Some countries even make locking a mobile phone illegal – a nice consumer friendly move.
2. CDMA doesn’t have a SIM, thus if you want to use an unlocked CDMA phone, you need to call the new carrier who tend to be even less nice than normal in this situation (it helps if you’re on pay-as-you-go tho)
(I know, for some carriers, being worse than the normal awful is hard but they manage it).
For GSM, you simply move the SIM – no carrrier involvement.
3. now if the local CDMA carrier has a faster network, one needs to weigh things…
All else equal, for me, GSM’s SIM is a very attractive feature.
“I don’t know the specifics in the telco situation in Canada” …. yet you feel the need to have some kind of comment … find out about the specifics and then have a comment … that might work …
@BustingTheSkullsOfIdiots … “I don’t know the specifics in the telco situation in Canada” … then why do you feel you are in a position to comment …
@Dion
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You’re absolutely right (!)
Things are terrible up here in Canada!
Awful!
Do yourself a favour – never ever ever come up here to visit or live.
Dion:
It’s hard to take you seriously when there are several spelling mistakes in your posts. Deniers??? insurence???
This is the mark of lazy thinking. Lazy thinking results in a dogmatic approach to life and politics.
Left? Right? It’s immaterial. We should be interested in the truth and it’s seldom that either side has the right answer.
Harummph. Thor has spoken.
@Dion and BTSOI
You two should get married…I would love to see how stupid your offspring would be
Socialism = Misery for All
Well the GSM Phones offered by Bell and Telus, do not all work in north america for fear of being unlocked and used on other networks the phones are built to operate on only dual band frequencies and those that are not available in North America.
Step 1- Buy iPhone in the states for $300
Step 2- Take your turbo sim card out of your Fido phone (get your CityFido unlimited calling plan off of craigslist) and pop it in your iPhone
Step 3- Dial away (Fido owned by AT&T;, n’est pas?)
Both Rogers and Blackberry undoubtedly have *many* friends in Ottawa, and not just Liberals apparently.