Pay As You Go – No WiFi calling?

[davec2012]

Certainly disappointing for those of us trying to save a buck or two. 

Why?

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[RogersMoin · Accepted solution]

Hello, @davec2012

Welcome to the Rogers Community Forums! 🙂

Thank you for sharing your feedback with us. Please elaborate more on your concern so that we can understand how WiFi calling may save money for Pay As You Go plans.

The main feature of the WiFi calling is to alleviate a poor signal issue in the places like basements, condos and tall buildings. 

The incoming/outgoing calls over the WiFi calling will be deducted from the airtime included in the wireless plan. Are you referring to the savings when you are travelling outside of Canada?

Please see Rogers Wi-Fi Calling FAQs for more details. 

Cheers,

RogersMoin

[davec2012]

Sure I’ll elaborate.

When at home or at other places with free wifi, I always prefer to use wifi so as to save on data cost. Why not cell minutes too? Wifi always is faster and more reliable anyway. I might add I also have Rogers Internet and a Rogers home phone. Why would anyone want to waste or pay for mins used on their cell phone when we already have paid internet? All cell phones with a Rogers Sim should simply default to wifi when available.

Hope that’s clear.

Dave

[OLDYELLR]

@davec2012 I believe what @RogersMoin is saying is that even if you could use wifi for calls and texts, you would still be charged as if you're using the cell network. So there's no savings. However, when someone sends me a text with a picture, I can't see it unless I turn my data on and then I get charged extra. I remember before I had a smart phone, texts with pictures gave me the URL for the pictures and I could view and save them for free using my Internet.

[davec2012]

So Let me explain further.

1. Why can’t pay as you go customers have wifi calling?

2. Why would I want to pay Rogers for data and or voice on my pay as you go cell when I’m connected to wifi at home and already paying Rogers for high speed? When at home I have all my devices connect through wifi. Why should I pay for different data protocols just to be delivered to my iPhone,iPad, Android etc I.e Volte, SMS and iMessage. Why are mobile devices considered different?

3. In the US many carriers provide this at no extra cost.

Just questions and would like to understand Rogers reasons behind these business decisions.

[RogersCilio]

Hey @davec2012,

I can certainly appreciate your input and inquiries. Regrettably, Wi-Fi Calling is a feature that is currently only available to customers with post paid service. 

Apologies, I understand that's not the answer you're looking for, but we'll be sure to update the Community with any information that may become available to us in the future.

RogersCilio

[barndoor]

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@OLDYELLR wrote:

 However, when someone sends me a text with a picture, I can't see it unless I turn my data on and then I get charged extra.

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Why .... have they changed this ?  I think on ours incoming pics are free ...it is only if you want to send a pic that it costs.  One does have to have your phone set properly though I believe .
 

[barndoor]

Sorry ...I guess i shouldn't say incoming pics  are " free " ...but they are the  same price as a regular text ,whatever that may be depending on your account . 

[57]

I've read a bit about WhatsApp.  It seems a lot of people worldwide use it, but I'm not sure many use it in Canada?  My understanding is you can phone or text others with the App on WiFi?  Any comments?  Do lots of people use this?  I assume it costs nothing - free download and free on any WiFi (outside of applicable bandwidth)

I rarely made calls or texted with my old flip phone, however, I just acquired an iPhone 5S (for free from a friend), so I may use it a bit more, although I still don't expect to use it a lot and will very likely stay on my grandfathered "Anytime" $10/mo plan, that has only cost me about $70/year over the last 9 years.

[OLDYELLR]

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@57 wrote:

I've read a bit about WhatsApp.  It seems a lot of people worldwide use it, but I'm not sure many use it in Canada?  My understanding is you can phone or text others with the App on WiFi?  Any comments?

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I don't know about using it on WiFi. My son drives truck for a produce company and they use the app all the time to communicate with the office, using their own phones. Of course it's just basically texts.

[fiona59]

Just download WhatsApp. I use it on free WiFi.

You just invite your friends/contacts. Once they accept you're good to go