11-01-2007, 08:00 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Data Plans From Rogers: Stop The Insanity!
While researching the HTC Touch that Rogers is releasing today, I came upon something that made my jaw drop: the "special" data plan pricing that Rogers is offering their customers.
In case you went blind looking at the sheer ridiculousness of the prices there, let me recap: the cheapest monthly fee is $15/month (keeping in mind $1 Canadian is about $1.05 USD now) and that gets you 2 megabytes. 2 FREAKIN' MEGABYTES. What can you do with 2 MB of data? Perhaps if you stick to short, plain-text email messages, and you browsed WAP sites from 1999, you might be able to live with that.
Oh, if you go over, you'll be charged $10 per 1 MB that you use. If you're willing to pony up $60 per month, Rogers will graciously extend to you 30 whole MB of data transfer, and only charge you $7 per 1 MB over that amount. Isn't that nice of them? If you want to get their biggest and best plan, $80 per month will get you a whole 200 MB of data, and if you go over you'll only be charged $5 per 1 MB. Gosh! Golly! At those prices I can maybe even receive a few HTML messages or attachments per day on my Windows Mobile device.
Digging deeper, I looked at their data plans page (which renders horribly in Firefox I might add) and realized that Blackberry users are even worse off: $60 a month will only get you 25 MB of data. They have a Windows Mobile data plan page here as well, and I was baffled to see only one option offered, a new plan I had heard about a month or two ago: $65 per month for 1000 MB of data, and $1 per addition MB. What a minute...that's almost (but not quite) reasonable. They recommend this for "tethered laptop use". It's certainly a massive cost savings when compared to the $80/200MB plan, but is it enough? No, not by a long shot.
Rogers, like most North American carriers, is constantly being battered by subscriber churn (a customer leaving for another wireless company) and desperately wants two things: to keep their customers from leaving, and to increase their ARPU (average revenue per unit); meaning the amount of money they make off each subscriber. Current data plans are a way to get a lot of money out of a small number of people. What Rogers and most of the carriers don't seem to grasp is that there's more money to be made overall if much larger numbers of users had less expensive data plans. Rogers seems content with charging 1000 people $100 a month instead of getting 10,000 people on a $20 a month plan.
Time and time again, I've had friends and family express interest in Windows Mobile devices, only to have them be scared away by the cost. And we're not talking the cost of the device - it's always the cost of the data plans. People are much more willing to spend $500 on a nice piece of hardware than spending $60 a month on data, year after year. Windows Mobile adoption is being crippled by the expensive data rate plans of Canadian carriers, and until they address the pricing issue, they're not going to see Windows Mobile smartphones selling as well as they could be.
Jason Dunn owns and operates Thoughts Media Inc., a company dedicated to creating the best in online communities. He enjoys mobile devices, digital media content creation/editing, and pretty much all technology. He lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada with his lovely wife, and his sometimes obedient dog. He thinks wireless phone companies are part of the Axis of Evil along with insurance companies and banks.
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11-01-2007, 08:08 PM
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Thoughts Media Review Team
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 749
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I suspect this may be one of the reasons the iPhone is taking so long to be introduced north of the border, even tho they are 'Rogers AT&T'. Who in their right mind would buy a phone like the iPhone, to have it hampered in its major functions by these ridiculous data plans!
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/drt
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11-01-2007, 08:14 PM
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Pupil
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 10
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Are they out of their minds??
I just checked my usage for this month (November) and I would have paid them $95 just for data usage 2 days!! and I thought the $40/month for the iPHONE I just got was a bit much. Glad I'm not in Canada! Are the phone companies being run by the RIAA?? When are companies going to learn, that it is better to provide what the people want instead of what the company wants to make on the bottom line? I understand they're in the business to make money, but give the people something that will work in the world as it is now, not as it was 20 years ago! 
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11-01-2007, 08:21 PM
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Philosopher
Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 555
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That's what you get for the government allowing a monopoly to exist in Canada for the GSM market. As far as I'm concerned, that's what happened when the competition bureau allowed Rogers to buy out Fido.
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11-01-2007, 08:32 PM
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Mystic
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 1,768
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I feel for you Jason, I really do. I have complained to friends about T-Mobile being slow to roll out 3G, but with the unlimited $5.99 (via proxy) or $19.99 all you can eat EDGE + WiFi, I guess I should be thankful. This surprises me that in the land where the Blackberry was launched that this type of service is still possible. Your government needs to open up the flood doors to competition.
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Jonathan (JonnoB)
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." -Edmund Burke
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11-01-2007, 09:00 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Don Tolson
I suspect this may be one of the reasons the iPhone is taking so long to be introduced north of the border, even tho they are 'Rogers AT&T'.
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Yup. The iPhone without unlimited data is just as useless as a Windows Mobile phone without unlimited data (perhaps more so because many iPhone users aren't super techy people). There's even a petition for Rogers to introduce a flat rate data plan just for the iPhone:
http://www.petitiononline.com/iPhone99/petition.html
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11-01-2007, 09:02 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by felixdd
That's what you get for the government allowing a monopoly to exist in Canada for the GSM market. As far as I'm concerned, that's what happened when the competition bureau allowed Rogers to buy out Fido.
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Indeed. I plan on doing up a post about the whole Rogers/Fido issue as well. And Telus will coming under my hammer soon enough as well. It's time to make some noise about this issue. :twisted:
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11-01-2007, 09:11 PM
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Neophyte
Join Date: Dec 2003
Posts: 4
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I'm a pretty serious geek, and it's the data costs that's keeping me from signing up with Telus. Unless I wanted to sign over my paycheques to them directly...
Jason, keep us posted with your fight with Telus! If there's something I can help with, let me know!
Clint
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11-01-2007, 09:41 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Jan 2005
Posts: 376
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oh ya, it feels good by still having the $50 Unlimited Data plan from Fido.. but to be honest the $65 Data plan from Rogers for WM phones is not bad, coz i never actually use over 1000MB's.. but it would still be nice having unlimited usage..
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11-01-2007, 09:46 PM
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Banned
Join Date: Jun 2004
Posts: 38
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Sounds like a classic Socialism vs. Capitalism example.
I can't wait until the US Govt socializes our healthcare system . . . but I digress.
I think Sprint is $15/mo for all you can eat down here in California. Don't tell me my life ain't work'n out!
God Bless the USA!!!
(Remember you can equal or free, but you can't be both!)
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