"Long distance charges may apply" when calling out of province number.

[yuvrajvedvyas3]

I am on $25/month 3G prepaid plan which gives me unlimited Canada wide minutes.

I live in BC , whenever I make a call to number in Ontario : I first hear the message "Please wait while we connect your call , long distance charges may apply" ; then the call connects.

Why am I hearing this message when my plan includes unlimited Canada wide? Do any of you get similar message before the call connects?

[computergeek541]

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@Nezgar wrote:

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@computergeek541 wrote:

All of Telus does this. Some years back, one of the competitors was criticized for removing this message.

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That competitor was Rogers -- and I was a customer of theirs with a plan that only included local calling, and this change made it MUCH harder to know if you were going to be charged 55c/min if the number you were calling, or yourself happened to be just a little too far out of town!

They did have a website where you could plug in your source and destination numbers and it would tell you if it was long distance or not, but of course all so much more clunky than before.

Justification of course being that "most" of their customers had nation-wide calling plans... Well, I wasn't one of them...

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I don't agree with their explanation.  This was back when many plans still only included local calling.  Eiminating the need to dial 1 made it so that nobody knew if the call was long distance until reeiving the bill a few weeks later.  While times have changed with many/most plans across carriers now including Canada-wide calling, Telus keeping the requirement to dial the 1 to avoid the long distance reminder messages was in my opinion (and still is), the right decision.

[Nezgar]

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@computergeek541 wrote:

All of Telus does this. Some years back, one of the competitors was criticized for removing this message.

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That competitor was Rogers -- and I was a customer of theirs with a plan that only included local calling, and this change made it MUCH harder to know if you were going to be charged 55c/min if the number you were calling, or yourself happened to be just a little too far out of town!

They did have a website where you could plug in your source and destination numbers and it would tell you if it was long distance or not, but of course all so much more clunky than before.

Justification of course being that "most" of their customers had nation-wide calling plans... Well, I wasn't one of them...

[jor123]

It's only ever happened on Telus brands for me, but I just added a 1 in front of any number in my contacts whether it was local or long distance 

[ChrisG1]

I'm new to PM so I haven't heard that message yet.  At my previous supplier, I would get that recording once in a while with NO extra charges to my bill, so I wouldn't worry about it.

CG

[computergeek541]

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@LeePublic wrote:

I don't think I've experienced this on other carriers. I believe it's only PM? I have been with Telus, Bell, Virgin, chatr, Lucky and have never heard this phrase when dialing a number until I was with PM. It's a minor annoyance, but I deal with it since I'm paying less for my plan.

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All of Telus does this. Some years back, one of the competitors was criticized for removing this message.

[LeePublic]

I don't think I've experienced this on other carriers. I believe it's only PM? I have been with Telus, Bell, Virgin, chatr, Lucky and have never heard this phrase when dialing a number until I was with PM. It's a minor annoyance, but I deal with it since I'm paying less for my plan.

[computergeek541]

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@yuvrajvedvyas3 wrote:

I am on $25/month 3G prepaid plan which gives me unlimited Canada wide minutes.

I live in BC , whenever I make a call to number in Ontario : I first hear the message "Please wait while we connect your call , long distance charges may apply" ; then the call connects.

Why am I hearing this message when my plan includes unlimited Canada wide? Do any of you get similar message before the call connects?

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This is simply because the call really is long distance, regardless of your plan including Canada-wide calling.  There will be no charges for the call.  Also, the call doesn't have to go to a different province for you to hear that message. The call only needs to be long distance (which can be still within the same province).

The area from which you are placing a call from has what is called a local calling area.  While local calling areas make no difference to Public Mobile customers who are making outgoing calls, there are customers at other carriers who have to pay long distance fees to call outside of the local area.

[darlicious]

@yuvrajvedvyas3 

This is a courtesy message from Telus. Since the network does not know you are a customer of public mobile or if you're a customer of another provider or what your plan is and what features it contains so it will give you this message when you do not dial (1) before your phone number that you are calling.

[will13am]

@yuvrajvedvyas3 , I think sometimes when 1 is not added in front of the 10 digit number this message is played back.  Don't worry about additional charges, this service is prepaid.