Rogers NA One Rate treats US data same as Canada

Rogers on Tuesday became a rarity among North American carriers by potentially eliminating roaming fees on its data plans. The North America One Rate plans treat all data usage on smartphones or modems in the US as though they were part of the customer's regular use in Canada; customers only pay for roaming if they go beyond the plan's existing transfer cap. Exact rates vary from $20 for an mail-only BlackBerry plan to $55 for a corporate 1GB plan with BlackBerry Enterprise Server features; a regular home user's 1GB plan costs $40.

The extension can't be added after the fact to an existing plan; Rogers instead points to its add-ons, which include either a $10 add-on that lowers the data rate to $1 per megabyte or packs that provide between 10MB and 75MB of data for a one-off fee of $30 to $60.

In adding the new plans, Rogers acknowledges that it's adding them as its high roaming fees for data use in the US have often been seen as prohibitive. Many customers simply switch data off entirely when they visit the US and depend on Wi-Fi.

Most other carriers in North America currently offer relatively little protection and often charge extra simply to lower the data roaming charges when abroad. Some will offer blocks of data for an extra fee but can often charge much more; AT&T, for example, charges $25 US for 20MB of international data and has no special rates for Canada.

By Electronista Staff