Text messaging a friend who is roaming

[thedaveCA]

Hi!

Could you confirm something for me?

I am a Rogers customer in Calgary and will be remaining in Calgary. Some friends are going on a trip to the US for a week, and then to Germany for a week, and finally on a cruise to a few other international ports. Sounds like a fun trip!

My friend is on Rogers and his wife is on TELUS, and are taking their phones with them. I'll probably be sending them both texts and pictures, and possibly calling each of them.

My plan includes Canadian long distance and text messaging, but I have no international coverage in my rate plan. Will I have any extra charges on my bill? If so, what rate will I be billed for these calls and messages, and how do I know what country they are in at any time so I can know what to expect on my bill?

**Labels Added**

[Pauly · Accepted solution]

Hi thedaveCA,

Welcome to Community Forums.

As a Rogers Wireless customer, you can not always know or tell when someone you are calling is using their phone within Canada or abroad, but you also should not worry about this either.  Your only billed on the number you are calling, not where in the world the person is located, so if you are in Calgary and Call or SMS a Calgary number,  then this is what the system bills you as, its treated as a LOCAL Text, not an international one.  The system does not care if your friends with a Calgary number are in USA or UAE.  That is something your friends have to check with on their end and worry about, not you.  The Receiving Party pays for roaming charges in this example.

You just need to know your calling or texting a Local number.

by the way, Here is a great tip, I was on a trip outside of Canada not too long ago,  a good way to keep in touch with friends/family within your travel group you can try video calling with third party apps like Whats App or Google Duo.  Most of my family had android phones so Google duo was already installed, and the best part? its cross platform capable so even iPhone users can use it too not only androids.  We would call each other this way when we were in our hotels to make plans for the day, it was easy to use and we had Wi-Fi coverage where we were staying so we actually had our phones on Airplane mode the whole time and did not have to think about incurring any extra charges.