Cell Service North Shore of Lake Superior

almcc wrote:
........

A lot of us Canadians are looking forward to having Verizon enter the Canadian market and break up the monopoly (cartel) up here.

Count me in! :M

Jpjlauer, I believe that Rogers acquired a few of the cell services north of Superior, TBay Tel, the provider in the Dryden area and the provider who serviced the Marathon area. As a Rogers customer in southern Ontario I couldn't connect to any of these cell systems when up there this summer in spite of having my phone set on roaming, go figure! And, navigating Rogers bureaucracy to talk to a real person is virtually impossible. A lot of us Canadians are looking forward to having Verizon enter the Canadian market and break up the monopoly (cartel) up here.

Just returned to the US after two weeks on the Northern Shore of Lake Superior - Sault Ste Marie to Thunder Bay. While in Sault Ste Marie I checked out three different Canadian Phone companies. Everyone had a different story about coverage and prices for service varied greatly. For example, I was ready to hand over my money to a Virgin Mobile sales clerk who told me with a Virgin sim card in my Verizon Razr Maxx and an add on data plan I would get coverage with no problems. Then the manager came out to help her activate the card, but he said I would not get coverage along the northern shore. I left the store (in a mall) and went down the line to three other service providers. All too confusing with no certainty of service so I did not do anything with them.
I called Verizon and added the $15/mo Canadian plan and they told me since they partnered with Bell I would have service where ever the Bell coverage map indicated it was available. The Northern shore of Lake superior was included. Great, so I also added a Global data roaming package to my Verizon account so I would have data as well.
To make the story short, I had practically "zero" service the entire trip until I reached Thunder Bay. Funny thing, however, was that I could receive calls and occasional text messages but never could I initiate them.
Some people did have service, but they were on TBtel. I talked to a TBtel rep in Thunder Bay just to see what went wrong with my "Bell/Verizon" service. She said while true that Verizon did share Bell service it all changed when TBtel bought the Bell service for the Northern Shore areas. Verizon may piggyback on Bell, but Bell no longer provides service to that area.
That's my story.

RangerJay wrote:

Jpjlauer wrote:
Great info Brian! Confirms my plan will work. Don't have an unlocked sim card phone, but I have a few weeks yet to try to find one.
Thank you

I'm anxious to hear how you make out - we live in Northwestern Ontario and just spent a few days between Thunder Bay and Neys - TBay Tel was spotty in Neys nothing in Terrace Bay - good in Nipigon - I think - despite your efforts - you will be able to find genuine benefit in being out-of-touch .....


Jay

Thanks for the information. I can't agree with you more about the benefit of being out-of-touch, however, we are not just vacationing for a couple of days or weeks. We travel for 6 months or more during any given year and have become dependent on the internet to pay bills, transfer money, research our next destination, maintain accounting records for a small business, and more. So if "service" is available I like to have it. And, I'm trying to do all the research now before I get up there so I can make the best use of my time in what I'm sure will be a very beautiful area.

When we get to the Thunder Bay area I'll follow up with a report on what provider we go with and our cell/data service experience.

Jpjlauer wrote:
Great info Brian! Confirms my plan will work. Don't have an unlocked sim card phone, but I have a few weeks yet to try to find one.
Thank you

I'm anxious to hear how you make out - we live in Northwestern Ontario and just spent a few days between Thunder Bay and Neys - TBay Tel was spotty in Neys nothing in Terrace Bay - good in Nipigon - I think - despite your efforts - you will be able to find genuine benefit in being out-of-touch .....


Jay

I'm with telus and soon as I hit the SSM city limits sign no more service, Nothing all the way up towards Terrace Bay. Yet I do see people using Cellphones , so not sure what gives with that.

Great info Brian! Confirms my plan will work. Don't have an unlocked sim card phone, but I have a few weeks yet to try to find one.
Thank you

FWIW I think your idea of going with Virgin is a good one - I use Virgin, with a 3G capable Samsung Geo phone, and while I normally keep data turned off if I need a WIFI hotspot I just enable data and WIFI on the phone and run my computer through that. They only charge for the data used and it goes up in tiers to 3 gig. They can enable a sim-card phone that is unlocked, so if you have one you don't need to buy a data-stick.

Brian

For the most part, the Bell/Telus shared network (Bell owns Virgin and Virgin uses Bell's network) has the best rural coverage in Ontario. We also don't have this 2G-only nonsense outside urban areas that I've run into with T-Mobile; (virtually) every tower was upgraded to 3G/3G+.

You should be fine along the highway, although the significant hills and valleys along the north shore do cause some trouble. I've found Bell's coverage maps to be accurate (bell.ca/coverage) - so check out where you'll be camping and you can be fairly confident if it says you'll have service.

Here is the coverage map for TBayTel (Thunder Bay Mobility) - they are the main (only?) provider in Northwestern Ontario. You'll note that the Lake Superior shoreline/highway coverage between SSM and TBay is not stellar ..... service is provided - but there are a lot of holes:

http://www.tbaytel.net/personal/mobility/coverageandtravel/coverage


Jay