Tracphone

I tried calling the number that came with the activation card to ask a question - they transferred me to guess where? To the Philipines - not anywhere in North America! I just wanted to ask if my tracphone could be operated as soon as I crossed the border into the USA! My phone number is a Texas area code but the phone should work as I have over 400 minutes on it! Talking to someone in another country is getting to be a pain when you need customer service you ahould be able to speak with someone in North America.

Tequila wrote:
I use AT&T GoPhone, works in Canada & Mexico as well. 10 cents a min US, 25 cents a min Mexico & 39 cents a minute Canada.

It roams on Telcel in Mexico, the largest network, and Rogers in Canada.

Thanks for the info. I might look at replacing my TracFone and Canadian Telus with this.

On a related note, does anyone know of any US cell plan that offers unlimited voice / data with roaming in Canada? (There appear to be lots of US companies with unlimited voice / data (doesn't actually have to be unlimited but I'd like 1000+ minutes voice / 1GB+ data) but I haven't seen any that included roaming into Canada).

I use AT&T GoPhone, works in Canada & Mexico as well. 10 cents a min US, 25 cents a min Mexico & 39 cents a minute Canada.

It roams on Telcel in Mexico, the largest network, and Rogers in Canada.

In future just top up your Trac Phone for a sufficient number of days before you leave the States for Canada, anticipating when you will be back in the US. That's what I just did. No big deal. Having said that, though, I wish we were buying only minutes used, not days as well.

In December I added 400 minutes which were doubled from my home in Calgary. I called them and they added the minutes but they did not activate until I crossed the Montana border.

I also activated Dell Voice which is now Fongo for use with my laptop in a WiFi area here in Yuma.

This is only available to Canadians gives you a local phone number and you can call anyone in N/A for free. If you wish to add International minutes the cost is minimal.

The reception is amazing but I did find you have to use headphone or the other party thinks you are in an echo chamber.

S.P. and Lola wrote:
After 3 no problem years today I was unable to update Tracphone service days from Canada. No explanation, no apology.
Guess I'm going to loose the 500+ minutes on my phone. Not a happy camper.

i had a very similar situation with these clowns (Tracphone). they absolutely positively have the worse CUSS SOME MORE SERVICE you will find any where. their product is just ok at best but again their CUSS SOME MORE SERVICE trumps any perceived value.

I haven't had to update from Canada in a while (my last Tracfone phone was a CDMA model which does work in Canada (at least it did in Ottawa (*** kind of works, not everything works which is part of the reason I just changed it to a TripleMinutesForLife GSM phone) and any minutes I added on that one would show up immediately as they do when you add minutes when in the states but before that, I'd add my minutes online (from Canada), keep a record of the transaction and the next time I was in the US, I would have to call customer service with the details of the minutes I added and they'd add them then. A bit of a pain especially since the phone wouldn't work immediately when I entered the US but it always worked for me.

Also, FWIW, I have no idea if it's changed but before after your time ended, you had 30 days to add more minutes before you lost your existing minutes (e.g. if you got a 200 min / 90 day card, you didn't have to add more minutes until 119 days later (although obviously from day 91 to 119, you wouldn't get any Tracfone service)). I did this several times when my days would expire during the summer (we don't typically travel to the US over the summer).

Bumpyroad wrote:

Lorne&Lorraine wrote:
Bumpyroad, since you don’t need more minutes, your approach makes sense. We use most of our minutes since the DW likes to call home a lot.

Four 60 minute 90 day cards gives us all the minutes we need in addition to one year of service at only slightly more cost than the continuation plan (with no minutes) and for less cost than buying a one-year card with minutes. Bumpyroad, you can input as many cards as you want at one time and the time and minutes both accumulate (ie four 90 day cards provides 360 days of service). No need to travel across the border to add cards sequentially. Just buy the four cards (or whatever) and add them to the phone before leaving the US (actually I buy the equivalent on-line, but the result is the same).

Unfortunately, Tracfone’s web site won’t accept a Canadian credit card with a Canadian address. Many businesses will not accept foreign credit cards on-line. I've even heard of Canadian gas stations that will not accept US credit cards. This is in spite of my understanding that the agreements that these companies have with Mastercard and Visa etc state that they must accept these credit cards no matter where in the world they are issued. But there is probably more to it than this.

S.P. and Lola, that is weird that the new minutes/time show on your phone even though it has no service. I don’t think that has been reported before for Tracfone’s in Canada except for CDMA phones that did have service. Interesting.

last I bought one, long time ago, you could buy the one year/400 minutes (don't remember if that was double 200 or straight 400) for under $100. do you buy the 90 day ones for less than $25.00?
are you positive that you can activate 4 cards at the same time sequentially? I thought that when I tried to add a card before the time was up that they would not tack it on the end, maybe was Onstar however. :)
bumpy

You can still buy the one year/400 min card for $100 and the minutes do double so one gets 800 minutes on a double minute phone. My four 90 day 60 minute cards cost $20.00 each. So I get all the minutes we need annually plus one year of service for $80.00. Yes you can indeed add time and minutes before the time is up and they do tack both on the end. I've been doing it like that for several years. With promo codes found on the internet I often get even more minutes than provided by the face value of the four cards. There's really not a huge saving one way or the other but no need to spend $20 if one doesn't have to. I just thought I would point out that there is another way of keeping the Tracfone alive for another year.

Lorne&Lorraine wrote:
Bumpyroad, since you don’t need more minutes, your approach makes sense. We use most of our minutes since the DW likes to call home a lot.

Four 60 minute 90 day cards gives us all the minutes we need in addition to one year of service at only slightly more cost than the continuation plan (with no minutes) and for less cost than buying a one-year card with minutes. Bumpyroad, you can input as many cards as you want at one time and the time and minutes both accumulate (ie four 90 day cards provides 360 days of service). No need to travel across the border to add cards sequentially. Just buy the four cards (or whatever) and add them to the phone before leaving the US (actually I buy the equivalent on-line, but the result is the same).

Unfortunately, Tracfone’s web site won’t accept a Canadian credit card with a Canadian address. Many businesses will not accept foreign credit cards on-line. I've even heard of Canadian gas stations that will not accept US credit cards. This is in spite of my understanding that the agreements that these companies have with Mastercard and Visa etc state that they must accept these credit cards no matter where in the world they are issued. But there is probably more to it than this.

S.P. and Lola, that is weird that the new minutes/time show on your phone even though it has no service. I don’t think that has been reported before for Tracfone’s in Canada except for CDMA phones that did have service. Interesting.

last I bought one, long time ago, you could buy the one year/400 minutes (don't remember if that was double 200 or straight 400) for under $100. do you buy the 90 day ones for less than $25.00?
are you positive that you can activate 4 cards at the same time sequentially? I thought that when I tried to add a card before the time was up that they would not tack it on the end, maybe was Onstar however. :)
bumpy

Bumpyroad, since you don’t need more minutes, your approach makes sense. We use most of our minutes since the DW likes to call home a lot.

Four 60 minute 90 day cards gives us all the minutes we need in addition to one year of service at only slightly more cost than the continuation plan (with no minutes) and for less cost than buying a one-year card with minutes. Bumpyroad, you can input as many cards as you want at one time and the time and minutes both accumulate (ie four 90 day cards provides 360 days of service). No need to travel across the border to add cards sequentially. Just buy the four cards (or whatever) and add them to the phone before leaving the US (actually I buy the equivalent on-line, but the result is the same).

Unfortunately, Tracfone’s web site won’t accept a Canadian credit card with a Canadian address. Many businesses will not accept foreign credit cards on-line. I've even heard of Canadian gas stations that will not accept US credit cards. This is in spite of my understanding that the agreements that these companies have with Mastercard and Visa etc state that they must accept these credit cards no matter where in the world they are issued. But there is probably more to it than this.

S.P. and Lola, that is weird that the new minutes/time show on your phone even though it has no service. I don’t think that has been reported before for Tracfone’s in Canada except for CDMA phones that did have service. Interesting.