At this rate, it would cost me about 1170 to see it through to Feb 2013
Or 260 to cancel it.

I’m tired of being surprised by my bill every month and trying to justify it “Okay, that makes sense, I did USE my phone that I’m already paying 70 dollars a month for. I shouldn’t be ACTUALLY making calls with it.”

Its ridiculous. Thank you everyone for all the information in this blog (especially Angry Chinese Driver!! I did read that essay of yours). I have now concluded that I am going to switch to Wind Mobile.

What can I say, I had been with Rogers since they used to be called “Cantel AT&T”. With Rogers, I used to pay $112/month. This included a maximum of 400 MB (not a typo) of Blackberry data, 150 anytime mins, “enhanced” voicemail, etc., unlimited long distance in North America. The reason why I needed the long distance plan was that I live in Oshawa and have a 416 number for my business. So any Toronto number I called was “long distance”. This took effect about 2 years ago after they re-established “local calling areas” and during the conversion, I was racking up between $30 – $50/month in long distance charges (nice one Rogers). The only feature that kept me sticking to my plan was the unlimited incoming call because they no longer offer that on any plan. No Rogers rep could offer me a cheaper plan and my bill just kept creeping. My largest bill was over $200 in 1 month.

So I took the risk and switched to WIND. For a penalty of 1 dropped call in 1.5 months, I now enjoy unlimited data, unlimited tethering, unlimited incoming, unlimited outgoing, unlimited long distance and all the phone features like voicemail, call waiting etc. For the next 12 months, I will only be paying $29. There are no other charges like the “system access fee” crap. As long as I am in the WIND zone (it’s been almost 2 months and I have only been outside of it once). Let’s do the math:

12 months with WIND: $348.00
12 months with Rogers: $1,344.00
Savings: $996.00

After a year, my monthly bill with go up to $45 a month but I would still be saving with WIND.

In other words, I get more for a lot less and best of all, there is no contract. With the savings, I can pay for my WIND phone twice over. I was so happy with the switch that I referred a friend and received a $30 credit on my first month. BTW, I still had 4 months left on my 3 year contract with Rogers. So as a parting gift from Rogers, they charged me the early cancelation fee (what a joke). It was still worth the switch. Thank you and good bye, Rogers.

I did give Rogers a call to see if they could match the plan, but they couldn’t really come close. Well, they came close until you started paying $8 for voicemail, $5 for a texting plan, etc., etc. After totalling everything up, I was offered a plan for twice the price with 100MB of data, and was assured that would be enough. This is my first smartphone (Google Nexus S for $80 through WIND), and interestingly enough, I blew through 100MB in 5 days. Would have been a lot less if I turned on WiFi, I guess.

WIND’s customer service isn’t as good as ACD desribes… I guess that’s what you get as you grow. I would call it “fair” at best. With that said, I’ve never had to wait to talk with someone… hit zero at the voice prompts, and you’re talking with a real person within seconds. My issues have always been solved with one call.

The summary, though, is that I think I made the right choice. I’d recommend WIND. In a perfect world, I could pull down data nationwide (like the Rogers rep claims above), but the truth is I don’t leave Vancouver very often. Turn off your data roaming, and you’ll be happily surprised to be paying exactly $29 each month. Plus tax.

With Rogers’ $17.50 plan (it was a great promotion!), I never once paid less than $40 a month.

Hope this helps anyone debating on making the switch.