The Chu Forums

http://www.redflagdeals.com/deal/comput ... d-calling/

That's pretty amazing if you're a light phone user.

whoa, that sounds perfect for winnie.
except we just renewed her contract with fido.

pwn'd

yeah basically.
i wanted to switch to rogers for a while too.

yea but you have to take these into account:

Unlimited Local Canadian Text Messaging - $75 Per Year

$0.75 Monthly Emergency Access Fee Not Included
$0.40 Charge Per Minute for Local Phone Usage

Unlimited Local Evening and Weekend Calling - $75 Per Year

$0.75 Monthly Emergency Access Fee Not Included
$0.40 Charge Per Minute for Local Phone Usage During Other Hours

i saw this plan too and thought of a few people who could use it, but you have to really calculate what it's really worth to you in a year. say you currently have a pretty good $20/mo plan total pretax. That means you pay $240/yr

now compare it to the $75/yr plan for unlimited eve/wknds, it really depends on your usage because you're being charged $0.40 per minute during the day. and $0.75/mo for emergency access fee. so $75 + 12*0.75 = $84 is your fixed overhead for the year including the emerg access fee. now what? $240-84=$156 is the difference it costs for this plan and your $20/mo plan. how many minutes does $156 buy you? $156/0.4=390 minutes. That means that in 1 year, you can only use 390 minutes to break even. 390/12mo = 32.5 minutes/month. I'd argue that even the "light" user could use close to 32 minutes per month. That's roughly 1 minute a day. And i'm guessing this plan charges by the minute, not by the second. Meaning you can only make 1 call a day during the day each day. seems pretty limiting even for the light user.

Now all this doesn't even take into account your add on options. If you want caller id, texting, etc, that adds even more monthly overhead. I'd argue unless your grandma is the one looking for a phone and doesn't even know how to dial, this deal isn't really that great. You could negotiate a pretty good retention deal for just $15-20/mo that includes caller id and texting and what not.

Thanks for the breakdown Dunc haha. I think that was all pretty clear. I wasn't suggesting it for any of us obviously, but just thought it was a pretty amazing plan for those who don't use their phones much.

but that's my point, even if you don't use your phone much, you have to pretty much not use it at all to make it worth while... it's only for grannies who carry a phone for emergencies if they need to call out or ppl need to call them... i think light phone user doesn't even cover it. you have to be like a hardly ever phone user

You mean like me?

Evenings and weekends are good for some people.
Like, take Jen Chow-Liu for example... she's not even allowed to turn on her phone at the hospital when she's at work.

She's an extreme example, but for me too... I rarely ever talk on my cell phone during work hours. I do occassionally, but if I had this plan and showed a bit of restraint, I could totally make it work. Of course, I'm spoiled by needing a data plan now, so it won't work for me, but if data didn't exist, then this would be a good plan for me to save money.

oops... forgot about weekends... well, there are 52 weeks in the year, and 2 weekend days in a week, so there are roughly 5 weekdays per week * 52 weeks meaning there are 260 weekdays. 390 minutes/ 260 weekdays = 1.5 minutes per weekday... i wasn't commenting on how much the person talks total.. just during the day... it's still only 1.5 minutes a day, but like i said, since it's probably charge by minute and not by second, that means you can only make 3 calls every 2 days... with those calls totaling up to less than 1 minute each time. It's a hard calculation, but even if winnie uses her phone 30 minutes in the month, those 30 minutes could have consisted of 60 calls. Not saying it did, so don't bother saying that she only makes 1 call for 30 minutes a month to her dying twin sister who lives in dubai and needs to hear her sister's voice to live on... just making a point.

i'm not saying it sucks... i'm just saying you have to be a really really really light user of the phone... and in no way i meant it to be for us... and if what you're saying is true, then winnie is a really really really really light user... does she have no friends?! haha.. jkjk we love you winnie!!!

she's at home like all day with the kids. who the eff is going to call her?
her day time minutes hardly reach over 10 minutes a month. it's her evenings and weekends that pile up a bit more (which still isn't that much).

but again, we JUST renewed her contract with fido. so that sucks major ass.

when you renew, you can still change your plan. You just renew again.

i think you missed the "with fido" part.

see if you can get them to match