New Pay As You Go Maximum Balance

[lmcjipo]

Had my prepaid phone off during the holidays and just turned it on today to receive the following text from Rogers:

Rogers service msg: Starting at the end of 2018, our prepaid services will have a maximum allowed balance of $150. Any balance above $150 will no longer be available as of end of 2018. We will be in touch with more information on how you can use your balance soon, but in the meantime you can continue to use your balance as normal. Questions? http://rogers.com/contactus

What are the options? The option that I think that they will do is to force those high balance users to go to postpaid. Unless they give me the option to get a new phone, there is no way that I would be able to use my balance or reduce it to under $150 before the end of 2018. The only other thing which would reduce my balance is for me to take options/services that I don't need (like data/SMS/addon services) that I don't need for the sake of just reducing my balance.

This seems ridiculous.

***EDITED LABELS***

[Unusual_Glark]

I just topped up $100 every year and was charged like 50c per call. Then like 6 months or so ago, they started charging me $10 a month. I guess it's the $10 a month talk and text plan. And now with this new balance limit I would guess I can't just add the $100 like I used to.  Like I said, I called Rogers and the guy said they'd change my expiry date so I can use the balance for a year but nothing happened yet.

[57]

@Unusual_Glark : What happened is that you were automatically migrated to the $10 Talk and Text Plan.  Most people are allowed to take their balance with them, meaning in your case you will likely be able to go for roughly 15 months before you will be charged the $10/mo normal fee for Talk/Text.  You will need to keep track of this on "MyRogers".

If you read through this thread and several others in this PAYGo forum you will see the changes that took place in the past year or so. Here's a post discussing those changes:

https://communityforums.rogers.com/t5/Pay-as-You-Go/Pay-As-You-Go-plan-changes/m-p/413623#M2018

[57]

I received an interesting text from Rogers today.  In it they state that I can continue to maintain a balance above $150. Rogers have extended the time to use any balance over $150 beyond the end of 2018.  There is no "end date" in the text, but they say they'll "keep me informed".

Interestingly, earlier this month I used $100 to suspend my payments for the next year and my balance is currently just under $150...

[pdqweb]

I find it curious that some Paygo "Anytime" customers get emails and some don't.

[57]

@pdqweb : Do you leave your phone totally "off" at any time?  I used to do that and also missed many texts.  The system only "keeps" texts in the system for a short while and if you don't have your phone "on/standby", those texts go into the ether.  See my link in post 338, item 5.

If you do leave your phone on/standby, I don't know why you don't receive the appropriate texts.  Perhaps you can mention it the next time you contact the PAYGo people.

[OLDYELLR]

---

@Unusual_Glark wrote:

I just topped up $100 every year and was charged like 50c per call. Then like 6 months or so ago, they started charging me $10 a month. I guess it's the $10 a month talk and text plan. And now with this new balance limit I would guess I can't just add the $100 like I used to.  Like I said, I called Rogers and the guy said they'd change my expiry date so I can use the balance for a year but nothing happened yet.

---

That's how I've always done it, except when my balance was well over $100, when I would call in and use $100 from my balance to renew.

Some time ago I learned from this forum that this Talk Anytime plan would be switched to a $100/month talk and text plan unless we called Rogers PayGo to have our Talk Anytime plan grandfathered. That is what I did and the Rogers agent was very helpful and agreed that keeping my old plan was the best deal for me. It looks like you missed that announcement. I would suggest you call PayGo at 1-800-575-9090. To reach a representative choose option 4, then option 4 again (how to contact Rogers). At the end of the information on how to contact Rogers, you will select option 1 to speak with an a agent. Tell them you were switched to the $10/month plan without your knowledge and would like your original plan reinstated.

[OLDYELLR]

---

@57 wrote:

I received an interesting text from Rogers today.  In it they state that I can continue to maintain a balance above $150. Rogers have extended the time to use any balance over $150 beyond the end of 2018.  There is no "end date" in the text, but they say they'll "keep me informed".

Interestingly, earlier this month I used $100 to suspend my payments for the next year and my balance is currently just under $150...

---

That's very curious. I just received a text that said

Rogers service msg: Starting at the end of 2018, our prepaid services will have a maximum allowed balance of $150. Any balance above $150 will no longer be available as of end of 2018. We will be in touch with more information on how you can use your balance soon, but in the meantime, you can continue to use your balance as normal. Questions? http://rogers.com/contactus .

I have a balance of $151.88. Not that I care a lot about the $1.88 I'll lose, just wondering why some customers can keep a balance over $150 into 2019 and others can't. I know there was quite an uproar over losing any balance over $150 from customers who didn't know they could draw from their balance to renew and it's Rogers fault for not advertising that fact.

[OLDYELLR]

---

@57 wrote:

@pdqweb : Do you leave your phone totally "off" at any time?  I used to do that and also missed many texts.  The system only "keeps" texts in the system for a short while and if you don't have your phone "on/standby", those texts go into the ether.  See my link in post 338, item 5.

If you do leave your phone on/standby, I don't know why you don't receive the appropriate texts.  Perhaps you can mention it the next time you contact the PAYGo people.

---

I turn my phone on and take it with me maybe two or three times a week when I leave the house. I'd be curious to know how long Rogers texts are kept deliverable, but I hope it's at least a week because not everyone has their cellphone on 24/7.  I would hope that any important text from Rogers remains active for at least that long.

[57]

---

@OLDYELLR wrote:

...I'd be curious to know how long Rogers texts are kept deliverable, but I hope it's at least a week because not everyone has their cellphone on 24/7.  

---

Per the link in post 338, they told me 2-3 days many months ago. Who knows if they still keep it that long.   Most people now have their phones on standby.  My iPhone 5S will last for almost a week in standby, so I keep it that way instead of off so that I don't miss anything any more.

Here's what I received:

Rogers service msg: Last year we reached out to let you know that at the end of 2018, our prepaid services would have a maximum allowed balance of $150. This message is to let you know that you can continue to have a balance that exceeds this amount. We have extended the time that you have to use your balance above $150 in order to continue to help you reduce your balance in a way that works for you. We'll keep you informed of any future changes. Questions?www.rogers.com/contactus

---

[OLDYELLR]

---

@57 wrote:

---

.   Most people now have their phones on standby.  My iPhone 5S will last for almost a week in standby, so I keep it that way instead of off so that I don't miss anything any more.

---

I don't know what the difference is between "on" and "standby" is. I don't think my LG-E410B phone has that option, but I would presume when the screen turns off it's on standby. I've just always turned it off when I don't need it. I still get spam texts I'm charged for whether the phone is on or off. But I'll leave it on now with a full charge and see how long it lasts. I just don't want to find I have a dead phone when I'm about to leave the house and need it.

[lmcjipo]

I started this thread about a year ago and I received this same text from Rogers a few hours ago when I was at work as well about the maximum balance going forward no longer being $150. Unfortunately, I was one of the people that Rogers got to take a postpaid plan so I'm not sure why they sent it to me except that my postpaid balance which I transferred is still quite high and at the current balance of my postpaid plan, it will take me over 3 years to exhaust the balance which I transferred from prepaid since I was worried about losing my balance which was in excess of their stated maximum $150.

This is like the AirMiles fiasco with their "expiring" points which after the outcry, they backtracked but nothing positive was done for those members who used their points to get items that they didn't really need or were saving for. AirMiles backed off from the expiration but increased the amount of points needed to redeem certain items (lowering the point value).

Once my balance expires in over 3 years on my Rogers postpaid, I will port my phone to a different carrier.

[lmcjipo]

Texts generally stay queued for a few days (I believe it is around 3 days) before they are deleted.

If you're the type of person who turns off your phone and only turns it on when they need it (like an emergency phone), if your phone is off for 1 week, you could wind up missing Rogers or other SMS messages.

I have a prepaid travel/roaming SIM/phone that I use when I travel. The SIM and the phone work in Canada (rate is ~$0.50/minute). Since I don't want people to call this phone number and people shouldn't be calling this phone number when I'm not traveling, the phone is generally off. I only turn on the phone once every few months to enable a billable charge on the phone (make a phone call or send an SMS) in order to keep the account active. Although this SIM and the carrier is not Rogers, I've done tests of sending an SMS to the phone number and after 1 week where the phone is off, the SMS is never received on the phone when I power it on. All carriers (including Rogers) have similar SMS expiration policies where they will try to send the SMS for a few days and then abandon/drop it. The sender doesn't get any notification that the receiver never got the SMS and the receiver doesn't get any notification that an SMS was sent when he/she powers on the phone.

[OLDYELLR]

So if I don't want to be charged for random spam texts I could avoid expired ones by leaving my phone off.  But I'd also miss expired ones from Rogers.  From what I've seen, the Rogers texts have not really been anything of vital importance, so missing one of those doesn't matter.  Besides Rogers, only family members have my cell number. Just yesterday I received a text from a "Lisa" soliciting contributions for a political party I had been a member of, but had never given them my cell number. Come to think about it, it was probably not even genuine, just random spam.

[lmcjipo]

Yes, if you keep your phone off, you won't or shouldn't be charged for the spam SMS messages but then you won't receive the free Rogers SMS messages regarding changes either.

For example, if my phone were off for the entire week at the time the original message about the maximum balance going forwarding being $150, I would have known anything about it and then when it came to topping it up, I would have topped up with another $100. If Rogers decided to not backtrack on the $150 maximum, I would have loss my entire balance except for $150 (and I had a very large balance on my prepaid account).

However, if you're worried about spam SMS messages, you should just do what I did when I had the pay as you go plan without any texting add-on which is every time I received a spam SMS message, I would contact Rogers and request a credit for the incoming spam SMS message.

I never used SMS since all of my friends who wanted to instant message me something would use one of the other chatting programs that I had (BBM, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Allo, etc.). In fact, I contacted Rogers Prepaid and asked them to disable SMS on my account and they mentioned that they couldn't do this on Prepaid and if they did, I wouldn't receive any SMS messages on my phone but would still be charged for the incoming SMS message that I never received on my phone.

[OLDYELLR]

I learned about the $150 maximum balance going into 2019 from reading this forum over the past few months. I only received the Rogers text about it the other day.  Of course, people who have their phones on 24/7 and charge them every day would never miss a text. But I only need it maybe 2 or 3 times a week and leave it off the rest of the time, so only charge it maybe once every week or two.  If I left mine on 24/7 I'd either have to keep it plugged in, or remember to charge it often so it wouldn't be dead when I need it.

[barndoor]

---

@Unusual_Glark wrote:

Hello, I have a pay as you go $10 a month plan. I already have $155 dollars and can't add another $100 for the year  like I usually do. Got an email saying I could exchange my balance for the plan for this year. I called and the guy on the phone said they could do that and extend the expiry date for a year. Though the date hasn't changed at all.  Had to get a $10 pay as you go so my $155 dollar balance doesn't expire. What do I do now? How long does this take to be able to use the balance I already have?

---

Did you want the $10 a month plan  ?  If you did that's great  ... but if they automatically changed you  when you were paying the $100 per year fee   then it is their bad  and they should switch you back to the anytime plan if you call about it .  

As well :  they should not take balance if you are on the ten dollar a month plan ....they should extend the expiry at no charge or there should be no expiry on whatever balance you are carrying  because as long as there is sufficient balance in your account to cover the $10 monthly fee at renewal time , that  should be all that matters to Rogers.... good luck 

[pdqweb]

"Yes, if you keep your phone off, you won't or shouldn't be charged for the spam SMS messages but then you won't receive the free Rogers SMS messages regarding changes either."

I keep my phone on standby so I should see all messages about my service - yet have never seen an SMS about annual topup from my balance. The operator offered to do this when I phoned. If I had topped up online I would never have known!

But why on earth can't Rogers send notifications by email - as they do for my cable tv account?  Not providing an option for my choice of notification is so last century.

[57]

---

@pdqweb wrote:

...have never seen an SMS about annual topup from my balance...

---

Clarification:  A few of us got an e-mail on that topic way back in 2012 and I believe it was only people who had high balances at that time.  The e-mail stated that the offer was only valid until December 31, 2012.

In November 2013, I received a text (not e-mail) stating they would extend that offer into 2014, however, there was mention in the text regarding Auto-Top-Ups, so it may not have applied to people who were not on Auto-Top-UP - not sure, just conjecture on my part. Rogers keep extending the option ($100 for a year and recently $50 for 6 months) to grandfathered Anytime clients.  There have been no notices that I've been aware on that topic since 2013, either by e-mail or by text.

The only way people learned of that particular option since 2013 is via this and other forums.

In addition, those people on Auto-Top-Up received an additional 10% credit from around 2014 to November 2017.

[barndoor]

---

@pdqweb wrote:

But why on earth can't Rogers send notifications by email - as they do for my cable tv account?  Not providing an option for my choice of notification is so last century.

---

We received notice of the $50 for six months  renewal using account balance  about 6 months ago  by email .We have also been informed of a couple other really excellent deals .... they were just pointless  for us .   I think they can inform us  IF they want to .

@pdqweb I think you just need to make it financially rewarding for them to notify you and it will likely happen .

[patdrummond]

In Nov. I phoned and had my old PayGo plan restored. Even now it's worth a try. (I posted elsewhere they will also allow all balanced to carry-over Dec.31 - for now there's no maximum.
=

[OLDYELLR]

At the end if 2018 my balance was $150.83.  Today, January 2, it's still $150.83. I never received an email or text saying my excess balance would be carried over. Just curious to know if anyone else got their excess balance carried over or confiscated.