Casual PrePaid Usage Comparison (7-Eleven vs The Rest)

[ud666]

When people leave voice mail on 7-11, there will be a deduction but then you get a credit like 10-15 minutes later for the same amount. I tested it myself. Anyone else confirm?

[DigitalParasite]

In order to change your plan you will need to apply the miniumum topup however once you are on the plan you want if you pay through online banking you will get 15 days expiry for 1$.

Nice find! So I could buy the $100 voucher with 365 day expiry and change to the AllDay plan ($0.25/min) which is better for me than the 1c weekend plan, and at the end of the year, just keep putting $1 from online banking to extend the expiry until I use up all my funds...

[Modie]

if you pay 1$ through your online banking you will get 15 days of expiry on any rogers paygo plan.

In order to change your plan you will need to apply the miniumum topup however once you are on the plan you want if you pay through online banking you will get 15 days expiry for 1$.

So does that mean you only pay around $2/month or do they deduct the $20 on top of that?

$2/month sounds too good to be true. So basically you can keep your phone alive for $22/yr. Although 7-11 has $25/yr as well so not bad.

[Keny]

When people leave voice mail on 7-11, there will be a deduction but then you get a credit like 10-15 minutes later for the same amount. I tested it myself. Anyone else confirm?

I checked the account balance before and after checking voice mail about two weeks ago. The balance did not change; no deduction at all.

[meat]

So to activate a 7-11 phone do I go to the Rogers website or do they have their own?

[sable]

The 7-11 phone is already activated. You just pay and talk. If you want to change the phone number, then you have to call their CS at 611.

[monomono]

At the request of another user, I am making available the spreadsheet I used to make these pre-paid comparison calculations. All you need to do is download the Excel spreadsheet and enter the average number of minutes you use per month and it will do all the calculations based on your usage.

You can find the spreadsheet here:
http://www.howardforums.com/showpost...45&postcount=7

Enjoy.

Many thanks for putting this info together.
The problem I have is I don't have an average monthly usage. Some months will be 10 mins, maybe next month 200 mins. So I guess long expiry time is the key for me. Unfortunately there are no 7-11's near me so I will probably choose Petro Canada (currently on Fido).

[migo]

I may confirm at least for 7-11 that the 30 cents LD rate includes air time. You can call any LD number in Canada and US for 30 cents a minute. It should be the same for PetroCan but I am not sure because I am not a PetroCan mobile user.

That's pretty cool, I didn't know that. Of course I haven't been checking my balance before and after every call.

[migo]

Many thanks for putting this info together.
The problem I have is I don't have an average monthly usage. Some months will be 10 mins, maybe next month 200 mins. So I guess long expiry time is the key for me. Unfortunately there are no 7-11's near me so I will probably choose Petro Canada (currently on Fido).

If you have widely varying usage then Virgin is probably the best. You can switch on and off the M plan, which is best if you're using a lot of minutes. The minimum monthly cost for Virgin isn't deducted from your balance (really isn't on any of the plans), it's just averaged out because of the top-up requirement. So if you make 10 minutes 1 month and 200 minutes the next month, that's just 210 minutes over 2 months deducted from your balance. If you have 75 day expiry it wouldn't matter if it was 105/month or 1 minute and 209 minutes it still costs you the same ammount. It's if you expect to make a long call you can switch to the 40c/day M plan with 10c/minute. For 3 minutes/day at 25c/minute you're paying 75c. For 3 minutes/day at 10c/minute + 40c you're paying 70c.

What would probably be best is to look at your usage over at least 6 months and do a comparison of what would have cost you the most and least with that usage. Then also do a comparison of what would cost the most and the least if your 3 highest usage months were done twice to see how much you'd end up paying if you call more than you expect. Also think about the possibility that you might have to make an hour long call (unless you have a land line) and depending on how likely you think that is include an extra 60-120 minutes in one or two of the months to see what might happen. You might find the ones that require regular top-ups and cost you $10-$15/month averaged out are the best because if you use 10 minutes/month for 6 months then that's only 60 minutes, but if you have to top up $25 every 60 days, that's $75, at 20c/minute that gives you a total of 375 minutes, so you would actually have 315 minutes left that you could use before it actually starts costing you more than $12.50/month overall.

[acidbaby]

heard that 711 nad petro charge for unanwered calls??
the time the phone is ringing
is that true?
do other providers charge this too??

[dontknowdontcar]

If you're calling someone, yes. You voluntarily chose to hit Send and use their network.

If someone's calling you, no. You have no control over whether someone calls you.

Unless there's been some massive changes, Petrocan and 7-11's Terms-Of-Use should be fundamentally the same (they're both run by Ztar Mobile), and in the TOU posted on Petro's site, it says:

All outgoing calls for which we receive answer supervision or which have at least 30 seconds of Chargeable Time, including ring time, shall incur a minimum of one minute airtime charge. blah-blah-blah... however, there will be no charged time for unanswered incoming calls.

[rsolomon]

I have compiled a comparison of the Canadian pre-paid services (May 2007)

Thanks so much! I just ran across this and confirmed that 7-11 looks like the best cheap plan for a casual US visitor for instance.



It's pretty funny that 7-11's current brochure lists 0.99cents as the per month charge - presumably they meant 0.99 dollars but I'd love to complain that they pulled 100 months fee out instead of one

Richard

[bcti]

Nice find! So I could buy the $100 voucher with 365 day expiry and change to the AllDay plan ($0.25/min) which is better for me than the 1c weekend plan, and at the end of the year, just keep putting $1 from online banking to extend the expiry until I use up all my funds...

Yes that is what I have been doing for some time now. Make sure you add in your tax so in alberta I pay 1.06 every 2 weeks on an auto transfer. I believe that less than a dollar gives you something like 5 days or a week.

[bcti]

So does that mean you only pay around $2/month or do they deduct the $20 on top of that?

$2/month sounds too good to be true. So basically you can keep your phone alive for $22/yr. Although 7-11 has $25/yr as well so not bad.

Well I guess that technically it would be 52/2=$26 plus tax. So 7-11 might be better if you just need an emergency phone however if you have racked up tons of credit on your rogers phone this is a good way to use it up. Also remember that it takes time for the transfer to go from you bank for me if I do it on weekdays the credit has always shown up next day but it might take longer at other banking institutions.

[cnlc]

Well I guess that technically it would be 52/2=$26 plus tax. So 7-11 might be better if you just need an emergency phone however if you have racked up tons of credit on your rogers phone this is a good way to use it up. Also remember that it takes time for the transfer to go from you bank for me if I do it on weekdays the credit has always shown up next day but it might take longer at other banking institutions.

Excellent. I still have over $140 from the last two years on my rogers payco account ($100/yr) so I can just add $1 every 2 weeks now to extend my credit until it's used up. I was considering the 7-eleven speak out but this will work just as well.

Thanks for the info.