Forum Discussion

was_butnotnow's avatar
Nov 07, 2019

Cell service in Canada

We have Verizon and they talk about turning on TravelPass for $5 a day only charged when actually using your phone when in Canada. Is this what most use or are there other options?
  • We have the Travel Pass from Verizon. It worked good for us. Only used it for long period couple years ago. On this trip we just shut the phone off for a day or two at a time to avoid incoming calls. Short trip we used it and didn't see the daily charge.
  • We went to New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island for 2-3 weeks this past July. We spent three days in Eastport Maine and noticed that our phones said that we were roaming, an indication that we were connected to a cell tower across the border in Canada. We called Verizon and got on to their Travel Pass plan to avoid the roaming charges. We were told that we needed to shut off the phone in order to avoid the $5 charge if it would connect to a Canadian cell tower any time of the 24 hour day. Since we have two phones we realized that we would be paying $10/day just to have the phones turned on. After 4-5 days we called Verizon back and got onto an Unlimited plan for the rest of the trip that included Canada. For the length of our stay in Canada, I think we came out ahead with the unlimited plan.
  • We traveled to alaska last year and to Nova Scotia PEI and NB. We just added unlimited plus MEX and Canada, It only cost about $25 extra on our bill. We were able to use our phone as a hot spot for internet use in campgrounds. The only areas we had any problems was in Yukon and parts of Alaska. Then we just switched our plan back to regular plan when we got home
  • We traveled to alaska last year and to Nova Scotia PEI and NB. We just added unlimited plus MEX and Canada, It only cost about $25 extra on our bill. We were able to use our phone as a hot spot for internet use in campgrounds. The only areas we had any problems was in Yukon and parts of Alaska. Then we just switched our plan back to regular plan when we got home
  • We've had good service with a TMO all inclusive plan- it's often better than in rural areas of the US. PEI to Yukon were fine with international included roaming.
  • AT&T has a one month international roaming plan that's a better price option than the day-at-a-time option if you're going to be there for more than a few days. Verizon might have something similar.
  • Bob806's avatar
    Bob806
    Explorer III
    I signed up for the Google Fi plan, no international worries at all. You can send texts & receive texts with no charges at all. Way better than my AT&T plan was.
  • WE have Verizon Unlimited and Canada is included and just got back from 2 months in BC, Yukon and Alaska. We found service spotty (understandable) in BC and the Yukon. In proximity to major cities and towns it worked pretty well. In AK, it worked only in towns (Tok, Valdez) until we got close to Anchorage when service became pretty consistant. There looked like cell towers in places where we had no service so I think there is something out there better but would not know what it would be and was pretty happy with what we had.

    BTW, our Hotspot also worked where our phones did.