No, this isn’t a story from The Onion. The CRTC says it will be pushing to lower cellphone costs for Canadians traveling both internationally and within the country.
A review found that Canadians often pay high daily fees for roaming abroad, typically between $10 to $16 a day, no matter how much they actually use their phone.
While daily roaming rates for the US and international are expensive, there are cheaper plans available from Public Mobile and Freedom Mobile that include roaming in the US and Mexico, for example. Some Canadians just can’t be bothered to switch cellphone providers because it’s normally confusing and time consuming.
The CRTC is calling on Rogers, Telus and Bell to come up with better roaming options. Companies have until November 4, 2024, to outline their plans or the CRTC may take further action (nothing was specified but this is supposed to sound scary to telecoms reading).
“Canadians need to stay connected when they travel, but often come home to high cellphone bills. The CRTC is taking action to help reduce roaming fees and is ready to launch a formal public proceeding if Canadians’ concerns are not addressed,” said Vicky Eatrides, Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer, CRTC, in a statement on Monday.
For domestic travel, the CRTC wants to update the fees that providers pay each other when customers roam outside their network. Many of these rates are based on outdated agreements. If providers can’t reach new deals, the CRTC will set the rates itself, through “final offer arbitration.”
“The CRTC expects this will result in lower prices,” said the Commission. That remains to be seen.
CRTC regulations limit domestic and international roaming to $100 within a month or billing cycle. The problem is your travel usually overlaps billling cycles.
The CRTC says it will keep an eye on roaming fees to ensure prices are fair for Canadians.
Reaction to the decision to do something no was blasted by consumer advocate and non-profit, OpenMedia.
“You looked into it, found roaming rates are *plainly* too high, and the resolution is… ask them to do better, or you *might* open a proceeding?!!” said OpenMedia on X.
“This is not good enough! This is how Big Telecom runs rings around us. They’ll be back at it when you turn your back,” added OpenMedia.
The announcement from the CRTC comes ahead of calls for an early federal election.
Want to see more of our stories on Google?
P.S. Want to keep this site truly independent? Support us by buying us a beer, treating us to a coffee, or shopping through Amazon here. Links in this post are affiliate links, so we earn a tiny commission at no charge to you. Thanks for supporting independent Canadian media!
Until they do, eSIM + WiFi calling is fine. Meanwhile my daughter in France pays 16€/month for unlimited everything and gets free roaming in most of the world (max 35 gb per billing cycle).
35gb isn’t unlimited
The 35 gb is when roaming outside Europe. It’s effectively unlimited in Europe.
Rogers supports out of country WiFi calling, but unfortunately Bell does not. I'm unsure about Telus and the flankers.
I didn’t know that. I’m with Fido (so yeah, Rogers) and I’ve had them disable international roaming on my line specifically to avoid any fees. WiFi calling goes through the eSIM just fine (at the expense of a little data and some extra battery usage).
Telus blocks it and although "maybe" they allow it in the US now, I don't know because after listening to weak, unfounded excuses as to why they didn't allow it, I dumped them. (It is very hard to argue a point about how something "can't" happen when Rogers and other carriers in other countries allow it).
Hey let's go out for a beer.
Can you please lower roaming 10% so we can gaslight Canadians? Don't worry, feel free to hike prices to compensate. Cue all providers charging $25 to ship devices, like Rogers.
CRTC is such a joke
I'm going on a 4-week trip to Asia, and will use an eSIM from Airalo – 10Gb data for $50, or 5Gb data for $30. Rogers "Roam Like Home" would cost me $300 + tax! Airalo takes literally 10 seconds to install an eSIM in my dual SIM iPhone, and I'm good to go. I can use Wi-fi calling to place and receive calls on my Rogers number at no further charge. Not paying exorbitant roaming rates to your Canadian carrier is the only way to give them a message. The CRTC won't make any progress by playing around…
The most they can possible charge you is $200, and that’s if it overlaps 2 billing cycles. But yes still a good idea to get a travel eSIM
Rogers charged me $270 when they enabled roam like home without my consent. I came off of a previous provider that prompted me to purchase a pass with either data or data and phone and text. They removed the charge, but not until I called 3 times and finally spoke to someone who knew what they were doing.
“CRTC regulations limit domestic and international roaming to $100 within a month or billing cycle.”
Either you’re lying or you have grounds to sue.
My normal bill was $120, new bill was nearly 400. Seems that roaming and mobile data both need to be disabled and you are automatically enrolled if not. Noot hard to find more complaints about this from the big three.
I'm now paying $34 with public mobile that includes US texting, calling and data. Best decision I made. In 24 months I'll have saved the price of a flagship phone.
A couple could be charged up to $400 plus HST over two billing cycles (ask me how I know!) I only use eSIMs now and rely on WhatsApp while travelling.
Or you know, just add roaming for 5$ to your plan.
Spoken like a true non Canadian…look up Rogers roam like home and come back and tell us that…
Check out Ubigi. I used to use Airalo. But the rates are better than Airalo and the esim is permanent. Just better once set up and you can get it all installed here before the trip. I used it in Japan.
+1. My family and I have successfully used Ubigi in both Japan and Europe. I've also used Orange eSIMs in Europe but prefer Ubigi's ease of use.
There are better esims deal on NOMAD
The crtc is independent of the government. Whether there is or isn’t an election is irrelevant.
The one dislike is from a Conservaclown who has 0 clue how the CRTC works
The crtc is independent of the government. Whether there is or isn’t an election is irrelevant.
I am confused, what the issue for roaming rates? I pay $36 a month for 250GB for Canada, US, and Mexico on Rogers. I say thats a pretty good deal in my opinion. Hopefully this CRTC over reach doesn't cause my rate to go up!
The issue is the world is bigger than the three countries you mentioned! If you travel to Europe or Asia while roaming you will get a large roaming bill.
Robelus leek moi S
The CRTC has a very long track record of weak half measures that barely make a dent if at all in RoBellus profits. Even when they are forced to finally comply with some of these half measures they just claw back the loss elsewhere in the form of increased activation charges and service fees for things that were previously free customer service requests. Also, roaming fees have been criminally high for decades in this country and they are just now realizing it's a problem? Way to go guys, really standing up for the interests of Canadian consumers with that weak threat. Watch them finally give us "affordable" roaming options in the form of every plan we sell is higher now
Say the clown being a keyboard warrior 😂 if you dislike them so much send them a letter, they could careless for what yours and my comments so suck it up and fight for change till then turn off the phone and PC and go for a walk
Of course they could care less. Do you enjoy dumping on others that merely need to vent about our corporate overlords in what they thought was a safe space? I’m outside every day Mr touch grass, but thanks
Rogers came out with a new plan at the end of August. It’s called the 5G Premium Infinite + Travel plan. It covers 64 countries around the globe waiving all roaming!!! They are tagging certain peoples accounts offering this plan to them for $75 less a $10 discount for auto payment. Here is the plan details….
https://www.rogers.com/support/mobility/infinite-premium-plan-travel
They need to lower rates of plans as raising them is doing nothing their cost has not gone up greed has, biggest issue is the amount of foreign workers they keep hiring instead of Canadians that needs to be addressed
The roaming rates were not so bad when they were $5 a day in US and $10 outside the US. But now they have gone way too high. And furthermore, Rogers was the first to offer the flat rate roaming and now Telus has it in far more countries. I can understand why it isn't in the Falkland Islands, but it should be everywhere served by fiber.
Lower roaming fees?
Brace yourselves for $100 activation fees because they got to recoup the loss of revenue from roaming, right? Poor little Canadian telcos 😭
Lower roaming fees?
Brace yourselves for $100 activation fees because they got to recoup the loss of revenue from roaming, right? Poor little Canadian telcos 😭