Is there a plan lower than 15 dollars per month?

[aarishlakhani2]

Hi,

I am an international student and I am visiting my home country for the next 4 months. I don't want to lose my current phone number and I have selected the minimum 15 dollar per month plan while I am not in Canada. However, I wanted to know if there is a special plan lower than this amount as I am not using a single minute of my plan. I have a friend using fido and he said they have a 5 dollar plan to keep their phone number when they are not in the country. Is there a similar service for public too?

Thank you

[treefrog]

@aarishlakhani2 

I suspend my service all the time for two or three months (no more than 88 days max) at a time by using lost/stolen when I am away for work and use the Rogers work phone instead.

[darlicious]

@aarishlakhani2 

Here are the options for your pm service while you are away.....

Spoiler

1. You can turn off autopay and allow the account to suspend at the of your current 30 day cycle but this is your least advantageous option. Pay and reactivate by day 85 or so.
2. If you have an account balance that exceeds your plan amount then you need to suspend via the lost/stolen feature in your account before midnight eastern on the evening of your renewal. Then on day 85 or so resume your service to pay and reactivate.
3. Suspending via lost/stolen before midnight eastern will keep your voicemail active allowing you retrieve voicemail and any verification sent by phone calls. However your rewards will not be applied to your account. Moderator/CSA contact after paying and reactivating is necessary to have the rewards applied manually.
4. Voicemail can be accessed by calling your pm number from a different phone by calling your phone # and pressing * once connected and entering your 4 digit voicemail pin #.
5. If you don't have an account balance or enough balance to cover your plan amount you can suspend via lost/stolen after midnight but before 2 am eastern on the day of your renewal. Once your rewards have been applied (usually by 12:15 am et) then suspend your account. Voicemail access will be lost.
6. Switching to the $15 plan with rewards helping to cover a partial or full amount of your plan allows you to call forward your pm number to your voip (such as textnow or fongo) number before you leave Canada.. Now any incoming calling to your pm number will ring thru to your voip number while on wifi or mobile data (w/a local or global sim card) You can access your voip voicemail for all voicemail messages.(Download the voip provider app before you leave.)

Most important mark on your calendar day 85 of your suspension and day 90. Do not forget when you must unsuspend your account via lost/stolen and/or pay and reactivate your service so you don't lose your phone number and account. Happy travels and Stay--Safe!

Say "Hi" to your mom from us!

If you do not have a credit card you can purchase a voucher and either preload it and suspend via lost/stolen as detailed in the spoiler above or hold onto the voucher (take a pic of it just in case)and load it to reactivate your plan by calling 1 855 4PUBLIC and enter your 10 digit phone number then press (1) and (1) again and enter the 12 digit PIN #. (You can use your voip # to do this.) Once added successfully your plan will automatically reactivate as long as you have not suspended via lost/stolen. You have to resume your service via lost/stolen either before or after loading the voucher by logging into your self serve account.

To contact customer support : Submit a support ticket via SIMon the chat bot Click here 

Or if you cannot submit a ticket via SIMon then Click here   ....for additional member supplied info.

[JL9]

Only the Tier 1 and 2 brands usually have a fee to park a number when you want to save it, tier 3 brands don't unfortunately, good news if it is only 4 months you can get by with just one 15 plan so that would actually be cheaper for you at about 3.75/month over the 4 months.

[Yummy]

PM does not have an option to temporary suspend account for a fee and $15 is the cheapest plan.

Your best option is to remove autopay - your account will be suspended for up to 90 days on next renewal due to no payment. Then on around 88th day, log in and manually pay for the next month assuming you left credit card info on file. After plan gets renewed for next 30 days, on next renewal it will again go into suspension mode and you have to repeat process.

Being international student you might not have credit card so you might arrange with friends to give them access to you account and they can renew your plan buying and applying voucher. Same process: pay manually, let it suspend, etc.

[softech]

@aarishlakhani2   Sorry, $15 is the cheapest plan offered by PM now

However, you can do something to save money.  Before you leave the country, you can remove Autopay and let the plan expired.  It will then go to suspended state and you have 90 days to reactivate it. But you have to really keep track of the 90 days, probably come back on the 85th days and make a $15 payment  and reactivate.  

To make sure nothing will go wrong, make sure you leave your credit card on the system, so you just  disable Autopay but leave the card there. Then on 85th day, pay and reactivate.  Very important, make sure you see the account changed to Status Active. 

Then you can either let it just activate for that single month and let it expired after, if you are not back to the country yet.   Or if by then you are almost back, then you can also enable Autopay after the account is reactivated.