TELUS to Launch 2 Year Unlimited Nationwide Talk/Text Plans on July 30 [Update]

TELUS has announced it plans to offer two year wireless plans on July 30th, which will feature unlimited nationwide talk and text and the ability to share data with multiple lines on the same account. The structure of these two year plans have two steps. First, users pick a device, then pick a data plan, as shown in the chart below:

Footnotes:

• The Smartphone category includes high-end devices such as the iPhone 5 and BlackBerry Q10, while Smartphone Lite includes lower-tier smartphones such as the iPhone 4 and Samsung GALAXY Ace II X.
• Bring your own device or “BYOD” refers to devices purchased at the month-to-month price or any unlocked device compatible with the TELUS network

Joe Natale, TELUS Chief Commerical Officer had this to say:

“In another significant step forward on our long-standing journey to put customers first in everything we do, we are introducing our next innovation in how we offer our wireless services,”

“Just as we did with our Clear and Simple plans in 2009, we have listened to our customers and provided them with a choice that offers the best of talk, data and text for Canadians and their families.

TELUS gives a few examples of how this might work:

• A single person gets a new iPhone 5 and a new Samsung tablet from TELUS, both on two year terms at discounted prices, along with a shared 1 GB data plan – $105 a month.
• A family of four gets a new iPhone 5, a new BlackBerry Q10 (both on the Smartphone plan), and two new Samsung Galaxy Ace II X’s (both on the Smartphone Lite plan), all on two-year terms at discounted prices. They already have a tablet, and add that to the data plan. They are fairly heavy data users, so decide to share 3 GB’s a month – $270 a month for the entire family.
• An individual already has their own smartphone they want to keep using so opt for the BYOD plan. While they talk and text a lot they don’t use much data, just a bit of social media and a few apps. They go with the 250 MB plan – $50 a month total.

TELUS today also introduced two year plans for Small Business, with some to include built-in U.S. data roaming for small business customers with 15 wireless devices or less per account.

The plan to change to two year term pricing started when Bell announced their own pricing last week, set to begin in on July 17th. Expect Rogers to follow suit. We’re following up with some more details from TELUS (ie iPhone pricing on two years), so stay tuned. These moves are in line with the new Wireless Draft code, which allows customers to cancel contracts after two years. Shortly after these changes were announced, incumbents warned pricing could increase for customers.

Update: We asked TELUS why customers should choose these new plans over the two year plans offered by Bell. Their response:

Overall, we are dramatically changing how we offer wireless, just as we did in 2009 when we launched our Clear and Simple plans. We have listened to our customers, and based on what they told us have created completely re-worked plans that offer the best of talk, data, and text for Canadians and their families. The key point with these plans is really offering customers with more value and peace of mind on their monthly bills –  Unlimited nationwide talk and text starting as low as $35 a month (if you bring your own device or purchase it outright) and the ability to pick the data bucket that best suits your individual/family needs or if you have multiple devices or subscribers on the same account, you can share data across the devices or subscribers and see a price decrease in what the individual would pay per month. The new SharePlus plans are a complete re-think of how we offer wireless to our customers and we’ve developed these plans with them in mind, really looking at offering more value.

We asked about two year device pricing but no details were provided at this time. They did say the following though:

…what we can say at this point is that we took into account that customers do prefer the low upfront cost of a device, so with that in mind device pricing will only change moderately.

…more to follow, refresh for updates