Does Public have phone plans in Europe?

[GlennK]

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

[darlicious]

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@dabr wrote:

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@darlicious wrote:

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@dabr wrote:

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@srlawren wrote:

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@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

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@GlennK who told you it's only Bell and Eastlink?  That's not right.  Bell, Telus, Rogers, Fido, Koodo, and Virgin all offer daily roaming plans internationally.  I'm not sure about Lucky, Chatr, or Freedom. 

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@srlawren  Freedom does offer roaming in Europe, I believe it's called World Traveller, you pay a monthly rate (used to be very reasonable $8) for calling and texting for a reasonable rate.  I always thought it was a good option when you're unable to access wifi, and IMO more reasonable than the per day roaming rates charged by other carriers.  That is if you only need to call or text occasionally.

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Freedom does offer roaming but it's at least $8 A day not per month. I travelled there last spring. At the time the 2 of us had 3 phoned between us. Freedom, fido and telus the roaming packages were around $10 to $15 per day much too pricey to bother. I had bought my dual SIM phone with our trip in mind knowing that prepaid plans can be as little as €5 per month including the SIM card.. (We pay some of the highest rates in the world.) My intention was to purchase a plan but with free public and commercial WiFi virtually everywhere there really was no need unless you need to do a lot of calling or texting . Sometimes a challenge to understand the language when connecting to free WiFi but we only had to use a few roaming calls and texts totally $9 between us. Free texting apps abound and messenger was the form of communication to stay in touch.

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@darlicious   When I mentioned Freedom having roaming for $8/month (World Traveller) which allowed reasonable calling/texting rates whilst in Europe, I was also speaking about it from personal experience.  I used to be with Freedom for 2 years and used the world traveller roaming which allowed me to call locally for 25 cents/min and 15 cents/min/text.  I received a text from one of their partnered carriers upon arriving in Europe informing me of the rates.  Of course calling back to Canada was a ridiculous rate of $2/min and 50 cents/min/text.  Either way it was nice to have the option of being able to call/text at, what I consider, a reasonable rate should the need arise when I wasn't within wifi range. 

I just looked at Freedom's options for roaming just now and here is what it says (basically, the same as before)...

Roaming (Travel)

World Traveller

Enjoy our reduced roaming rates in 50+ destinations around the world from as low as $0.25/min., $0.10/text and $0.10/MB.

$8

/mo.

See all destination World Traveller rates

To activate the World Traveller monthly add-on, visit My Account.

I generally agree with your point about Canada having higher cell phone rates compared to other countries, although I would add that Canadian carriers don't have the luxury of serving large population bases over a smaller geographic land mass, which would mean higher infrastructure costs for the Canadian carriers.  That's not to say our rates couldn't/shouldn't be cheaper, just that the comparison isn't always fair.

Sorry for the confusion as it looks like we were both referring to the same thing I just didn't remember the monthly fee for reduced roaming rates and was quoting the daily rates for texting, calling and capped data which are $10 per day from freedom. As a former freedom customer I never had a problem with their rates or service only the need to roam outside of the city and the unfortunately spotty and poor signal strength at my home in Vancouver.  Nothing they could do about that just an unlucky dead spot between towers/repeaters.

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[GlennK]

They really don't have one in Canada either.....lol

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@chukdefatey wrote:

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@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

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Public Mobile doesn't have a Network in Europe. Why would they have or offer Plans for a Continent where they have no Network.

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[dabr]

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@chukdefatey wrote:

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@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

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Public Mobile doesn't have a Network in Europe. Why would they have or offer Plans for a Continent where they have no Network.

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Seeing that PM is owned by Telus, who have partner agreements with carriers in Europe, it could do it, but of course it has to be a reasonably priced (similar to Freedom Mobile) for it to be of practical use for users here.

[dabr]

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@darlicious wrote:

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@dabr wrote:

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@srlawren wrote:

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@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

---

@GlennK who told you it's only Bell and Eastlink?  That's not right.  Bell, Telus, Rogers, Fido, Koodo, and Virgin all offer daily roaming plans internationally.  I'm not sure about Lucky, Chatr, or Freedom. 

---

@srlawren  Freedom does offer roaming in Europe, I believe it's called World Traveller, you pay a monthly rate (used to be very reasonable $8) for calling and texting for a reasonable rate.  I always thought it was a good option when you're unable to access wifi, and IMO more reasonable than the per day roaming rates charged by other carriers.  That is if you only need to call or text occasionally.

---

Freedom does offer roaming but it's at least $8 A day not per month. I travelled there last spring. At the time the 2 of us had 3 phoned between us. Freedom, fido and telus the roaming packages were around $10 to $15 per day much too pricey to bother. I had bought my dual SIM phone with our trip in mind knowing that prepaid plans can be as little as €5 per month including the SIM card.. (We pay some of the highest rates in the world.) My intention was to purchase a plan but with free public and commercial WiFi virtually everywhere there really was no need unless you need to do a lot of calling or texting . Sometimes a challenge to understand the language when connecting to free WiFi but we only had to use a few roaming calls and texts totally $9 between us. Free texting apps abound and messenger was the form of communication to stay in touch.

---

@darlicious   When I mentioned Freedom having roaming for $8/month (World Traveller) which allowed reasonable calling/texting rates whilst in Europe, I was also speaking about it from personal experience.  I used to be with Freedom for 2 years and used the world traveller roaming which allowed me to call locally for 25 cents/min and 15 cents/min/text.  I received a text from one of their partnered carriers upon arriving in Europe informing me of the rates.  Of course calling back to Canada was a ridiculous rate of $2/min and 50 cents/min/text.  Either way it was nice to have the option of being able to call/text at, what I consider, a reasonable rate should the need arise when I wasn't within wifi range. 

I just looked at Freedom's options for roaming just now and here is what it says (basically, the same as before)...

Roaming (Travel)

World Traveller

Enjoy our reduced roaming rates in 50+ destinations around the world from as low as $0.25/min., $0.10/text and $0.10/MB.

$8

/mo.

See all destination World Traveller rates

To activate the World Traveller monthly add-on, visit My Account.

I generally agree with your point about Canada having higher cell phone rates compared to other countries, although I would add that Canadian carriers don't have the luxury of serving large population bases over a smaller geographic land mass, which would mean higher infrastructure costs for the Canadian carriers.  That's not to say our rates couldn't/shouldn't be cheaper, just that the comparison isn't always fair.

[chukdefatey]

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@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

---

Public Mobile doesn't have a Network in Europe. Why would they have or offer Plans for a Continent where they have no Network.

[darlicious]

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@dabr wrote:

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@srlawren wrote:

---

@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

---

@GlennK who told you it's only Bell and Eastlink?  That's not right.  Bell, Telus, Rogers, Fido, Koodo, and Virgin all offer daily roaming plans internationally.  I'm not sure about Lucky, Chatr, or Freedom. 

---

@srlawren  Freedom does offer roaming in Europe, I believe it's called World Traveller, you pay a monthly rate (used to be very reasonable $8) for calling and texting for a reasonable rate.  I always thought it was a good option when you're unable to access wifi, and IMO more reasonable than the per day roaming rates charged by other carriers.  That is if you only need to call or text occasionally.

---

Freedom does offer roaming but it's at least $8 A day not per month. I travelled there last spring. At the time the 2 of us had 3 phoned between us. Freedom, fido and telus the roaming packages were around $10 to $15 per day much too pricey to bother. I had bought my dual SIM phone with our trip in mind knowing that prepaid plans can be as little as €5 per month including the SIM card.. (We pay some of the highest rates in the world.) My intention was to purchase a plan but with free public and commercial WiFi virtually everywhere there really was no need unless you need to do a lot of calling or texting . Sometimes a challenge to understand the language when connecting to free WiFi but we only had to use a few roaming calls and texts totally $9 between us. Free texting apps abound and messenger was the form of communication to stay in touch.

[dna2016]

@GlennK unfortunately, Public Mobile only offers North American services, other than unlimited international texts. But the texts are only when you're texting from Canada outwards, no roaming abilities for texts.

If you're looking for plans while in Europe you'll need to purchase plans from a local provider such as Vodafone. To be honest it'll most likely be cheaper just to get service from a local provider. Depending on how long you're staying you can probably get an unlimited, no contract, low cost plan from a provider there as opposed to trying to get roaming coverage from a Canadian company. That's kind of the whole reason you get an unlocked phone, no limitations 😃 

[sheytoon]

@GlennK are you looking for a plan that you can use when in Europe (roaming)?

Or do you want to dial European numbers when you're in Canada on the PM network (long distance)?

Either way, Bell and Eastlink are not your only choices, as @srlawren has helpfully pointed out.

[YVR]

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@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

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You can also buy a sim in Europe.  Here an good overview link of the prepaid ones that you can buy when you are there

https://www.theworldwasherefirst.com/best-international-sim-card-for-europe/

[dabr]

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@srlawren wrote:

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@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

---

@GlennK who told you it's only Bell and Eastlink?  That's not right.  Bell, Telus, Rogers, Fido, Koodo, and Virgin all offer daily roaming plans internationally.  I'm not sure about Lucky, Chatr, or Freedom. 

---

@srlawren  Freedom does offer roaming in Europe, I believe it's called World Traveller, you pay a monthly rate (used to be very reasonable $8) for calling and texting for a reasonable rate.  I always thought it was a good option when you're unable to access wifi, and IMO more reasonable than the per day roaming rates charged by other carriers.  That is if you only need to call or text occasionally.

[srlawren]

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@GlennK wrote:

I was told that Bell and eastlink are the only local carriers that provide europe phone plans.

---

@GlennK who told you it's only Bell and Eastlink?  That's not right.  Bell, Telus, Rogers, Fido, Koodo, and Virgin all offer daily roaming plans internationally.  I'm not sure about Lucky, Chatr, or Freedom. 

[Triguy]

PM only offers roaming in the US.  You would either have to buy a local sim or use Gigsky sim.  If you have wi-fi then you could use apps like Skype, Textnow, Whatsapp, or Fongo.

[Dunkman]

@GlennK 

Public mobile only has roaming plans for USA.  Nowhere else.  

[kselmak · Accepted solution]

Sorry no

Roaming is offered only in USA

Unlimited calling is offered only to Canada and usa

Some European countries are listed for the long distance add-on but it is very limited list

In Canada Long Distance Add-Ons

Any unused minutes will roll over to your next cycle.

400 International Long Distance minutes $15

International countries include: Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Italy, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Poland, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Singapore, Spain, Thailand, United Kingdom, United States, and Venezuela.