Suspend cellphone account whilst away

[PWP]

Hi I recently got a Rogers SIM for my 'phone for the times I'm in Canada (I live in the UK, but go to Canada often). I pay $30 / month but was told I could suspend the account whilst away to reduce the bill to somewhere around $7-8 / month until I return and re-activate. I was told I could do it online, but I can't find anywhere to do it. Anybody able to advise me on this? Thanks!

Peter

***Edited Labels***

[RogersPrasana]

Hi @PWP

Welcome to the Community Forums!

We can assist you with completing the temporary suspension for your wireless line, send us a private message to @CommunityHelps and we can take a look.

@RogersPrasana

[PapaO]

I need to suspend cell phone service as my wife is in hospital for next 4 to 6 months thanks in advance

[Mrhedyehzadeh]

I want to move another country and may return back to canada eigth months later. I want to deactivate my simcard until my return.

Is there any way for this?

[Meowmix]

Hello @Mrhedyehzadeh

You can contact Rogers by calling them and have them suspended the account. However you are still responsible to pay each month the account balance. That will be your monthly fees that get charged.

If you fail to pay that then they may close down the account for none payment and take you to collections.

[JakeyPrime]

This is mostly correct. If you have a tab on your phone, then you are unable to suspend your account, as you are paying off your phone slowly over time, hence the point of the flex-tab. However if you're on a plan where you own your phone, or you're paying month to month, then Rogers can for sure suspend your account for a tiny monthly fee to maintain your phone number and all your account information, and making sure you don't need a credit check on your return. 

You can call Rogers Care and they would happily take a look at your options and see what they can do for you, to make it as easy as possible during your time away!

[ABC1237]

If you have a month to month plan and you suspend your account, and pay the montly suspension fee do you retain your plan or do you need to get a new plan when you reactivate?

[JakeyPrime]

The point of the suspension fee is to reserve your phone number and all the plan details you have, as well as your account. As soon as you remove the suspension it's all there. But obviously while it's suspended the plan is not active.

[1Jay]

I have a share all plan with 3 numbers on it. I wish to suspend one number for 10 months while the user is out of the country (& using a cheap pay as you go sim while away) I want to retain the number but the number will not be used at all. The phone is paid off.
I was told it was $14 every two months to keep the number. Is this the case?

[RogersMaude]

Good evening @1Jay,

Welcome to the Rogers Community and thanks for your post!

Making sure you're able to save money, while a phone you pay for won't be in use, is a great idea!

We're glad to provide you with your options.
 
If you wish to keep your plan the same, we can offer you a temporary suspension for 2-4 months. 
You will need to contact us within 30 days from your requested suspension date, to get it added to your account.

The cost is $7 plus tax /month. It discounts your monthly plan without changing it completely:
•    You will be charged your suspension fee monthly. 
•    Your plan and services (with monthly service fees) will automatically be restored when the suspension is over.
•    The suspension must start on the first day of your bill cycle date. 

We are able to provide you with long term suspension solutions, however a price plan change is required.
If you want the full 10 months discounted, we could put you on a minimal plan. The goal is that you'll have the ability to keep the phone number, for when the user comes back to Canada.

The seasonal plan is $16/month, on which we offer a $9 monthly discount, for up to 12 months, if the phone is not in use. Therefore, you'll be paying $7 plus tax /month.

As price plans and offers do change month over month, we cannot guarantee your existing price plan/pricing will be available upon your return. We will be happy to review all price plan options available at the time, to ensure you have the right plan to suit all your needs.
 
If you would like us to submit the suspension request of your line, please send a private message to @CommunityHelps. For more information on our Private Messaging system, click here.

Hope this helps!
 
RogersMaude

[WenWen21]

Can you suspend your line but pay the minimal for the tab plan? Since I don't own the phone. What are my options?

I am leaving the country and coming back end of this year. 

[RogersMaude]

Good day @WenWen21,

Welcome to the Rogers Community!

I understand your desire to suspend your line while you're not going to be using your cellphone.

You can only benefit from an actual suspension if your contract is over.

If you are thinking of changing your plan for the least expensive on the tab you're currently on, that is something you can do. Check out our in-market plans at www.rogers.com/plans.

Do you know when your term ends? 

RogersMaude

[RoddyB]

Hi
I have a number on my family share plan that won’t be used for 4 months as my son is out of the country. There is a balance owing on the phone. I need to suspend the account so that I do not pay the $250 in monthly charges ($60/mth for that number). I do not want to cancel the number - just suspend it I was told I have to pay off the full large balance of the phone (over $400). That doesn’t make sense as I will still continue the monthly plan when he comes back and continue paying off the phone for the exact remaining months as before I suspended it. Why does this not be allowed for Rogers?? It’s not logical or make business sense no one is out of pocket and exact same terms will continue after he comes back - so why won’t Roger’s allow it?
Thanks

[RogersZia]

Good evening @RoddyB,

Welcome to the Community and thank you for your post 🙂.

I appreciate the reason why you'd want to suspend the device for 4 months, especially if your son is not planning to use the roaming option. As advised by my colleague earlier, we can only suspend the No Tab (out of term) lines at this time. 

I realize this isn't the ideal response. We appreciate you sharing your opinion and feedback with the Community.

Thank you for your understanding.

RogersZia

[RoddyB]

Thank you for replying. However you say ‘thanks for the understanding ‘. Actually I do NOT understand and I would like someone to look into this pleas.
My ask is not for anything from Rogers. Just to suspend and then continue in all respects: pay the monthly and pay off the balance of the phone once he returns.
Yet Rogers is just intent on taking about $250 from me for no reason. What a money grab!
There must be someone at Rogers who can look at this from a business perspective and say that their system is flawed and anti the customer. So make an exception or policy change.
Thank you.

[BS]

@RoddyB  I hear what you say when you say honestly that you don't understand. Statements of that nature are kind of presumptive, but the limitations of chat and email in that one can never understand the feelings of others, or full understanding of what the solution presented is.  It just didn't work well.

Great that you came back and said you don't understand.

As I have been in a similiar situation a few years back when my daughter was on a phone plan (family plan as it was called at that time), with money owing on the "tab".  We weighed the pros and cons of what the best decision was for us, whether to just keep paying and pay off the phone then drop her plan as she was not returning - we cancelled once the phone was paid off and that was the best deal - each option varies depending upon your plan and circumstances.

On another situation a few years earlier, she went for a work placement from school for phone months and at that time we were able to cancel her plan for four months and her add-ons, but on return we could not get the add-on because they dropped it and the outcome was it cost us more that time around due to the unknown.

I don't think that this forum is a good place to figure this out, although it is a great place to hear other people's stories, get suggestions from others who went through their own, but ultimately, you need to look at the pros and cons in discussion with a representative who has access to your account and decide what is best.  My both daughters both got tired of it and when they aged out of our support, they both left Rogers, due to the amount of work I had to go through to deal with short term shut-offs, which is not uncommon with students.

The challenge in my experience is that Rogers is constantly changing add-ons, plans, conditions on what and how much you can cancel, and once you think you know it, the next time you are dealing with something new - I find it impossible to understand without hours and hours of discussion and htought, and worst is when they go and change the rules while I am thinking it out.

The rules around cancellation change all the time, and are not necessarily the best option depending upon how much you owe on a phone as they may call it a cancellation of conditions of the plan.  The one time cancellation in our case led to a request to pay full for remaining of the phone, but after reviewing it, they goofed - we had kept the plan in place, cancelled a data add-on only and left all ather conditions in place as it was cheaper to keep paying the plan than to pay off the phone.

And in my experience, it is often very confusing the explanations you get, so I can see perfectly how you don't understand.

As I mentioned, get all information, and weigh the pros and cons, and if necessary, you do like we did, bought out the last phone and moved to another company - that didn't lead to any give on Rogers side for us, so outcome, they lost both my daughters and they are the ones they made the money on, not my wife and me.

Good luck.

Bruce

[57]

---

@RoddyB wrote:
...I do NOT understand and I would like someone to look into this pleas. My ask is not for anything from Rogers. Just to suspend and then continue in all respects: pay the monthly and pay off the balance of the phone once he returns.

---

If I understand your situation, you wish to suspend payments on a phone for a few months, however, that phone is not yet "paid off" and is being paid off as part of your monthly payments to Rogers. This would be like having a car lease and not wanting to pay the lease (or portion thereof) because you're not going to drive the car for a while, or perhaps taking out a car loan and wishing to suspend those payments (or a portion thereof).

Although large leases, loans, contracts can sometimes be renegotiated (near bankruptcy for example), I doubt it's done much for small items like a phone - too much trouble.