Telus-owned Public Mobile is disrupting the Canadian cellphone plan landscape at the moment with their promo $38/4GB plan (after credit card auto renew) and unlimited province-wide talk. The plan caused Virgin Mobile to match the plan, which then caused Fido to match as well for those in BC and Alberta.
Public Mobile’s promo expires on Sunday, November 20, 2016. Online SIM card sales stopped earlier this week as they would not deliver in time and just the other day the promo was no longer advertised on the Public Mobile website (it is still available though, when you enter in your SIM card number on the activation page).
The company announced yesterday it would launch on the ground SIM card sales and pick up in Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto, starting today and lasting until tomorrow only, for last minute switchers (and those who have not received cards).
It turns out Canadians really want to jump on Public Mobile, as one user on Reddit shared an image of the initial line up in Toronto on 25 York, full of eager switchers:
SIM card sales are supposed to go from 11am to 7pm local time, but Public Mobile announced cards sold out in Vancouver by early afternoon. The initial line up in Vancouver was as long as 75 people deep according to iPhone in Canada reader @khairais, right at the 11am start (Public Mobile ended up moving people across the street to not disrupt the Telus building).
For those in Vancouver, an updated address for SIM card sales is now the corner of Richards Street and West Georgia.
Did you line up for a Public Mobile SIM card today? If you’re about to switch, click here to follow our tutorial on how to port over with your iPhone.
Thanks Sean
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gosh start with iPhone and people camp out for SIM cards? really? whats next? limited edition SIM card injection tool?
Well in this case lining up will save you money vs dropping a G or more on an iPhone ????
No different than lining up for a phone, or lining up for Black Friday Deals, or Boxing Day deals, etc.
I switched yesterday and their service is great
Agreed
Luckily I ordered and had a public mobile sim in stock from past. I hooked that up. But need another for my daughter. Was thinking of going to get one from Toronto but looks like it’s will be hard to get one cause of these lines. Should have ordered online when had a chance.????
Try Craigslist or Kijiji. Probably some people willing to sell for a referral.
Will do. Thanks Gary.
Since it got such a big respose, I wonder how often we will see this happen from other carriers trying to get their customers back.
Let’s hope this game continues and we can get 6GB unlimited everything for $30 lol
Just picked up my SIM at 25 York St, Toronto. There was a lineup of about 30 pple.
Nice!
I activated 4 lines for my family and I. All is working excellent, can’t believe how much we are saving and probably the best plan in years.
Nice work!
Hey Gary, now that you’ve been on the PM network for a few days, how does it compare to your old fido service? Is it safe to say that It has all the benefits you’d expect from the coverage provided by the telus network of towers?
Yes. I have not noticed anything different coverage-wide from being on Fido, aside from no longer having Visual Voicemail (still waiting for someone to leave me a voicemail!), Wi-Fi Calling (not a deal breaker for my area) and VoLTE. So far, LTE speeds have been very fast, so I’m happy.
Good stuff.
Thankfully I ordered my SIM online over a week ago. Great deal and I really hope this causes other mobile providers to take note, and leads to cheaper prices for Canadians overall
Yup, very unexpected by one the big 3, but a win for customers.