Receiving OTP's while outside Canada

[musicollector]

Can this be done using PM?

[musicollector]

Clear as mud!  😄 I have heard the terms, but once they were defined, I understood how they work in PM's context. Thank you.

[darlicious]

@musicollector 

There are three types of data at public mobile:

1. Plan data : This is the mobile data that comes with plan ie. $40/4.5gb+500mb (autopay bonus data)=5gb (This data expires at the end of your 30 day cycle and the data counter resets upon renewal.) Promotional data described as bonus recurring monthly plan data also expires and it's data counter resets upon renewal.
2. Data add ons : This data is normally purchased ($15/1gb or $5/200mb) but can be promotional data given upon activation, gifted data such as the "more is merrier" holiday gifts, data add ons earned thru feedback or customer engagement sessions such as beta testing or contest data prizes or random promo data that appears in your account or offered to reactivate your plan services for example. This data is either given or purchased one time and does not expire rolling over every 30 days until completely consumed.
3. 10 Day US Roaming Data add ons : Either purchased  as a bundle or on their own these data add ons expire after 240 hours from the date and time of purchase or once completely consumed.
4. Points Redemption data add ons act exactly like their purchased or gifted counterparts but cannot be stacked or multi-redeemed. One redemption at a time.

[musicollector]

Ordered my PM SIM abd looking forward to activating it. I believe I will be happy with it. 

LOL...I guess I have to pay more attention to what I read! I see I will get 250 MB with the $15 plan, which is more than enough for me. Not sure why I was clamoring for an add-on or bonus! 🙂

[musicollector]

When you say, "add-ons" do you mean what we pay for? I was under the impression that all data that we pay for expires after 30 days. That is a non-starter for me.

[darlicious]

@dust2dust 

Yes....key word "hopefully".....

[dust2dust]

Don't bank on freebies. There's no guarantee they would happen.

Add-ons rollover on the account until used up.

[musicollector]

""more is merrier"...which will not expire, correct?

[darlicious]

@musicollector 

Just make sure you time your mid-"travel" reactivation to occur in December so hopefully the 4th annual "more is merrier" campaign gifts you the 500min holiday international calling add on. 

[musicollector]

Now, I see international texts are free. As I understand, this refers to sending them while in Canada, not receiving them while abroad.

[musicollector]

BTW, I found a great provider, Textfree. Works flawlessly calling the U.S. I am gonna stay on their good side. LOL.

[musicollector]

Aaaah, that ain't gonna happen. 🙂

[darlicious]

@musicollector 

That is correct.

[darlicious]

@musicollector 

You can call the US you just need either the $15/1000min US calling add on, a "more is merrier" holiday gift international calling add on or a $50, $60 or $70 plan.

[musicollector]

"...if you take the sim card with you..."

I see no value in taking the PM SIM card with me while traveling as I would not be able to use it outside Canada, anyway. Am I right?

[musicollector]

I have run out of options in terms of providers. Pretty soon, I'll find out that every one of them have banned me - let us see, Talkatone is left. I don't want to get banned by them, as well, as I need a provider to call the US when I get back home, seeing I cannot do that with PM (they are only Canadawide).

[darlicious]

@musicollector 

How do you figure? The sender is sending the code to your pm number. The Mighty text app is forwarding it to the voip number. How would the voip provider know it's a short code? That being said maybe @BeachNBeer can weigh in since he has used Mighty text whereas I have not. You can probably just get it sent to your account that you log into to read the text.

[musicollector]

As stated, their bone of contention seems to be where exactly I am when I answer that call. Childish, yes, because I am the one paying for the data and the Web is seamless among countries, but they have their own reason. And, they can keep it because I will have none of that anymore.

Why did they ban me? Only they know...and God!

[musicollector]

"...it makes no difference where you are on earth to recieve the calls as long as you are connected to the internet via wifi or mobile data".

Being rather knowledgeable, that is what I thought. I was wrong. It doesn't seem to work that away. Those guys track me down using the IP address. As soon as they see I have an Indian IP address, game's up! Apparently, there must be some reciprocal payment going between Indian telecoms and these providers.

[musicollector]

No, I am fed up. I believe the same thing will happen when I receive my first OTP. Wasted too much of my time on those already. 🙂

[hTideGnow]

HI @musicollector , since you got banned by Fongo and Textnow, maybe you can also try a third one , Talkatone

[darlicious]

@musicollector 

@hTideGnow 

You only need to remove the sim card from the phone you can still take it with you when travelling to the US to avoid connecting to a US cell tower. The sim card only needs to remain in Canada in a working always powered on phone kit you are using a text forwarding app. The texts can also be accessed by signing into your text forwarding app account online.

Edit:

Though it's a good idea to have a spare pm sim card at home with a trusted friend or family member in case you need to perform a sim swap and you can have them call forward your pm # again if you take the sim card with you and either suspend or if you lose the sim card.

@musicollector 

If you use a voip provider Canadian phone number to call forward to your pm phone # to it makes no difference where you are on earth to recieve the calls as long as you are connected to the internet via wifi or mobile data. Otherwise the calls go to your voip provider's voicemail.

[hTideGnow]

HI @musicollector   I still do not understand why you cannot forward a call to Fongo or TextNow.  I know you said they banned you, buy why?   

and you are trying to forward phone calls or forward text  now?

[musicollector]

**bleep**...Murphy's Law. There will always be a wrench thrown into well laid-out plans! 😞 So, I am back at square one. Well, I will have to have one of my children pass on the OTP's to me. What a pain! Let them try banning THAT!

Isn't there a plan with calling to the U.S.? Many of us have a need to call our southern neighbor, you know. 😛

[hTideGnow]

Hi @musicollector   No, you can only forward to another Canadian number.  That's why people usually get a VoIP number for that

Also, after you forward the number, leave your phone at home.  Or if you are bring your phone to US, you need to remove the PM SIM, the moment PM sim talks to US network (they will talk even you don't have roaming addon), PM will disable the forwarding.

[musicollector]

Thank you for the idea. I think that is the definitive solution. You may have addressed the OTP issue for me, finally! I don't need to grovel and attempt to be in the good graces of some developers!

An obvious thought...would PM allow me to forward outside the country?

[darlicious]

@musicollector 

The call forwarding of the pm phone number isn't necessary. I just mentioned it since you will pay for service to use the text forwarding you might as well call forward the phone number so you can recieve your pm phone calls as well. Of course both the text forwarding and the call forwarding has to be done in Canada. If you just call forward then the sim could go with you but text forwarding requires the set up as described. You just leave it with a trusted friend or family member. If you suspend while away and later reactivate the set up process has to be repeated to again have calls and texts forwarded.

[musicollector]

A warning for others who use these virtual phone numbers!

Yes, I was told that I was banned. The only questionable thing I did was, for the first time, access them from India, as I had never done on previous visits. In fact, I had been using them for some time, Textme for years, and never had a problem. Of course, the first thing I did after finding they no longer worked was use several of of my 9 emails to sign up - no luck. I believe they have recorded my IMEI number or some other hardware-based ID of the device because I factory reset my phone, to no avail! As long as I use the device, I am hooped. It is only my device that is affected and not those around me. It is no mere coincidence that both apps stopped working after I used both of them to receive OTP's. But, I don't care because I don't need them anymore and I am absolutely positive I 'll never go to their paid model! Luckily, I have now discovered the awesome TD authenticator tool. I wish other banks and credit cards would follow suit.

[hTideGnow]

HI @musicollector   why they banned you? what was the reason?

you sure they banned you or your system just cannot send to VoIP number?  some shortcodes don't send to Fongo.  Some shortcodes can send to TextNow but require a subscription with TextNow

And even they banned you  , you can always use new email to create new account 🙂

[musicollector]

Funny you should say that! I used exactly the above two to receive OTP's back in April and May and they have banned me permanently! They must be really upset because they both refused to reverse the ban! Apparently, a no-no. 😂😝😅

[hTideGnow]

HI @musicollector   MightyText is not a VoIP, it just help to send text using your Android number.

Forwarding calls or text to VoIP app like Fongo or TextNow would not use too much data.   Text is tiny, even voice is just around 0.5Mb per minute.   And , you can choose to turn on the app only when you are in Wifi if you are really short on data