Saving Money on Cell Phone Use in Canada

Since there's been a lot of hype recently in the cell phone market with the launch of the iPhone, I thought I'd point out an easy way to potentially save yourself a couple of hundred dollars on your cellphone bills every year. It essentially hinges on how much you use your phone and when. If you're a heavy user, just continue to regularly examine your cell phone use and shop around, assuming you're out of contract of course. If you're a light user, then consider using a pay as you go or prepaid plan. For example, I'm on Roger's Paygo. I use their virtually unadvertised $100 (+ tax) prepaid card, since it has 365 day expiry time. I'm also on their 1 cent evenings and weekends "plan" with it. This does last me an entire year. So I'm paying $8.33 (+ tax) a month for a cell service and it includes call display and optionally voicemail. If I put more money into the account before the time expires, it all rolls over into the next 365 days. They allow you to build it up to a maximum of $500 I think. Any Roger's phone can be turned into Roger's Paygo, once out of contract of course. They may even give you some free airtime to get you going.

I'm not running a Roger's commercial here, but they do use the technically superior GSM for their network. I wish we had another GSM competitor in this country. But there's also a few other reseller deals using Roger's network that are also very good value. The first is 7-11 stores, with their Speak Out Wireless offering. The second is Petro-Canada Mobility.

If you're stuck with no option but to use Bell's network, then please have a look at Virgin Mobile.