As many Canadians know, our phone plans are pretty abysmal. I was wondering what Canadian JETs (future or current) were planning to do with their phone plan while in Japan for the 1+ years:
* Keep your current plan and stick to roaming rates if you need to use it?
* Drop down to a cheaper plan for the duration (what plan??)
* Cancel your Canadian phone plan altogether???
* VoIP????
Just looking for some advice and if I have somehow missed a carrier with good roaming rates or a cheap plan. (My plan was to go with Freedom’s 12-month plan until I learned they don’t support roaming in Japan, period ðŸ˜)
6 comments
I switched to the cheapest plan available, cost like $100 a year with Bell in 2018. No Data. The number lived on a SIM card in an envelope back home for my 3 years. Then before I came back I had my parents upgrade the plan to normal so it was ready to use right away!
Not Canadian, but I was looking into moving my American # to Google Voice and then getting a Japanese number while I’m there. Maybe that would work for you too?
I cancelled mine and got a Japanese phone contract. Everything can be done through the internet.
I currently have a year hold on my Canadian SIM. It cost something like 10$ a month to do from Koodo. When I come back to visit this summer, I’m going to switch it to the cheapest pay as you go option, just to keep the number while I’m still in Japan.
As everyone has said, you’ll need a Japanese phone number.
I’m with Public Mobile, got to suspend for three months and then reduced to lowest plan of 15$ cause I only plan on being in JET for the year.
If you do cancel remember to let eeeeeveryone know (Banks, CRA, any accounts that use as multi factor authentication) cause I got locked out of so many accounts after realizing I couldn’t get any texts on my Canadian cell even if my plan had “international texts”. Had to call CRA through Skype too cause many Japanese cells don’t do long distance
I have a ridiculously nice phone plan, which I don’t pay much but get a sizable amount of data.
I am worried my plan won’t be here when I return if I cancel it, so I’ll be paying it even though I will not be using it. I might use the Dual SIM on my phone for the time being.