American plans for Canadian drivers ?

I live in the US but got to Canadia every week and Verizon sure beats the hell out of ATT as far as coverage and rates.

I have a buddy that's really into all that, I'll see what he's using and post back... I'm pretty sure he has T Mobile.

 

U did not do your homework corect. I am living in Canada and I do have 2000 minutes but I pay only 119.99/month. The plan that cost 160$/month has 4000 minutes.

 

4000 = 167 hours a month. Tat's a lot of talking while driving.

 

U will probably wonder but every month I get over those 2000 minutes so I have upgraded to 169.99$/month for 4000 minutes. I never broke that barier but I reached 3000 minutes.
Right now I'm ND and is so boring.....what alse can I do beside driving ? Talkin is a viable option thou.

 

If I were a Canadian driver that spent a lot of time in the States, I'd say the cheapest option would be to invest in an unlocked GSM phone, or get an AT&T prepaid "GoPhone." You can get them for $20-30 at Walmart. Then either use the cheap phone or pull the sim card out and put it into your unlocked phone while you are down here. If you search around on the internet, you can find a "gophone" sim card by itself for $4-5. Amazon.com has them.

 

MrMustard please make the things more clear for me coz I dont understand (and I am intrested).
As a Canadian driver I did choose Verizon for some very simple reasons. First is that Verizon is the only one that has a plan called "USA+Canada voice". So no matter where I am I can call USA or Canada numbers on a daily basis. I do only long trips so I need to talk with my family and ....we are quite chatty. There is nobody for now that offer plans with Canada included(not even Verizon offer'em anymore).
Then I do have the broadband card which gives me 5GB of data anywhere in USA+Canada(and this is a huge help for me). I am an independent Owner Op and I need to send a lot of faxes, confirmations and emails almost every day.
It cost me around 300$/month but I couldn't find any other combinations possible to suit my needs. That was the reason I asked u if u could be more clear.
For fax I pay 13$/month and I can send from my truck at any time and from anywhere(using data). This is too save bucks.

In Canada wireless providers are all voracious thugs and I quit using their services long time a go. If u see Canadian plans and devices u will either laugh or cry. All providers are hand in hand and the rob people shameless.

If I would not talk a lot and I would do just 2-3 days trips probably would be other options, but in the above explained situation I find "the best" solution for my needs.

All the best !

 

There are two types of radios. CDMA, and GSM. Verizon and Sprint use CDMA. CDMA, as far as I know, only exist in the USA. Canada, and the rest of the world all use GSM. The two major carriers in the USA that also use GSM, are AT&T and T-Mobile.

What I was suggesting is to get an unlocked GSM phone. Basically you'd be buying the phone out right, because it's not tied to a carrier. It's more expensive up front to do this, because you aren't getting the phone at a subsidized price. GSM phones all have Sim card in them. They look like this:



That is the brains of a GSM phone. Your contacts, phone number, everything, is stored on that chip. A phone that's locked to one carrier, will only accept a sim card assigned to that carrier. An unlocked phone will work with any sim, as long as it's activated by a carrier, it doesn't matter which one. If you do a google search for "unlocked gsm phone," you'll find a lot of vendors selling them. You can then get a sim from a Canadian carrier, and use that in Canada. Then you can buy a sim from AT&T, activated with the "pay as you go," plan.

http://www.wireless.att.com/cell-phone-service/cell-phone-plans/pyg-cell-phone-plans.jsp?wtSlotClick=1-0050TW-0-2

It's $2 a day for unlimited talk and text. When you cross the border, you simply pull the battery, and swap out the sim cards. Your phone number would be different. You can get a sim by itself from ebay, or they have them bundled with cheap throw away phones at Walmart.


I don't know how this solution would work for you,I guess it depends on how much time you spend down here in the States. But if Canada was my primary running area, with an occasional trip across the border, that'd be the way I'd go.

I'm not sure how Verizon works in Canada, but if you have a Canadian Verizon GSM phone, it would pay dividends to find some ubergeek to unlock it for you.

 

Thank u sir for info. Unfortunately I cannot afford more than one phone number. There are a lott of load brokers that know my number and sometime when is weekend or after hours they answer at my calls just because they know my number and we have strong business relations.
Technically u are right. From strict money pov is true that I can bring improvements. But practical being a company I need to look professional and what I need the most is to be fast in comunication.
BTW, Verizon is not present in Canada. If they will come the rest of providers will close the doors in a matter of months. Verizon are far from perfections, but beside any Canadian wireless providers they are champions by far.
Thanx again.

 

Countries with CDMA networks where Verizon phones will work:

http://b2b.vzw.com/international/technology/cdma.html