Freedom Mobile. Anyone on it?

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Reviving this thread.

I had an issue recently with Freedom mobile network out in Oakville, which is suppose to be fully covered. I only was able to get 1 signal bar. Anyhow went to the corp store today and well they told me I needed an new SIM card which will put me on the proper LTE network (Home with the low case letters. If you have HOME all caps it is the older LTE network). I can already tell it is much better. We'll see though.
 
sburns said:
Reviving this thread.

I had an issue recently with Freedom mobile network out in Oakville, which is suppose to be fully covered. I only was able to get 1 signal bar. Anyhow went to the corp store today and well they told me I needed an new SIM card which will put me on the proper LTE network (Home with the low case letters. If you have HOME all caps it is the older LTE network). I can already tell it is much better. We'll see though.
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Good thing you came out to pick up that tag. Some good comes out of it . I too have the all caps HOME so will see about changing out the sim card. Thanks for the update.


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Robbo said:
Good thing you came out to pick up that tag. Some good comes out of it . I too have the all caps HOME so will see about changing out the sim card. Thanks for the update.
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Yes things worked out in the end =)
I also was able to find one of the few iphone SE's left, so I got a hardware upgrade for free. :cool:
 
Still with them for 4 lines in our house.

All friends who switched are still with them.

More friends considering it on the advice of us, plus the aforementioned other friends who have switched.

All of the above, still happy.

Their $50 plan right now is impossible to beat, and although it doesn't carry the same size roaming allotments as previously (so far as data at least), for someone who spends most of their time in their native networks footprint, it's not a biggie. And even then, remember, their plans are actually unlimited - even the roaming data...it just goes a little slower once you use your fullspeed allotment.

If you're not sure, do what I've suggested previously - go to a Freedom store and signup for a line (with JUST a sim, you don't want a contract or any obligations, just month to month) and ask for a new number. Pop the SIM into your existing phone and actually use it for a few days as your primary line. If it works for you, go back to the Freedom store and ask to port your existing number to that SIM and replace the "temp" number you were given - it only takes about 5 minutes and you're golden - you've fully switched.

If for some reason you don't find the service satisfactory, you simply cancel the new line inside the 7 day (or something like that) cooling off period and you're only out the cost of the SIM card. Pop your old SIM back in your phone and continue on.
 
I’m also with Freedom.

Works well in the city. Reception is pretty ****** outside the city. But I’m happy with 10 gigs for $50.
 
You shouldn’t be having issues outside their coverage zone as you’re basically roaming on the Big3’s networks at that point, so it’s their networks weak spots, or perhaps an issue on your handset preventing a solid connection.
 
It’s definitely a Freedom issue.

I switched from Telus and had a good signal pretty much everywhere. With Freedom I’ll often drop to 3G whereas my work phone (Bell) still has LTE and I’ll have no network whatsoever available along rural sections of the 401.
 
Yeah Freedom is still hit and miss out here. At least half the people I know have switched away from them. Ymmv
Do the trial thing.

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caboose56 said:
It’s definitely a Freedom issue.

I switched from Telus and had a good signal pretty much everywhere. With Freedom I’ll often drop to 3G whereas my work phone (Bell) still has LTE and I’ll have no network whatsoever available along rural sections of the 401.
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New phone or same phone as you had with Telus?

I’ve driven the entire 401 end to end and have had no service strength issues with my Freedom line.

I’ve seen this occur before but it usually turns out to be a SIM or handset config issue.

The only areas I experience problems is on their fringe coverage areas - the phone tries to hang onto the Freedom tower too long (and ends up with basically unusable service) vs just giving up and switching to away. If I’m stuck in such an area for an extended period often I’ll just lock my phone to away and the problem is solved.
 
Same phone. I lose signal consistently between London and Ingersoll.

Otherwise, in town, it’s great. And it’s good enough that I have no plans to switch away from them.
 
Ended up adding another line at Fido and the big surprise was getting it at Costco. They provided lots of added value. iPhone 7 on a 4G plan for $65 less 10% 500 minutes. Free evenings. Good service at the new Leaside/ Thorncliff store.


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Wife and daughter are on it (wife switched/ported from Bell). On it since August last year. We live in Etobicoke (wife works in South Mississuaga) and we have absolutely ZERO complaints. Daughter is on the phone a lot (surfing, texting, etc.), never an issue. I didn't even bother setting up WiFi for them at home, just use Freedom's data. Neither uses the phone much for talking if that matters--but when they do, no issues.

When they are out of the GTA coverage it roams onto Rogers et.al at no extra charge (never been an issue) but the data cap sucks when roaming (500 MB/month). For them this does not matter, they don't use heavy data when we are away from home--text and voice does get used outside of GTA and again no issues.

Both phones are Samsung A8 if I remember...(free with the package).

For us it just fits their needs. If you needed big data outside of coverage, spend a lot of time outside of coverage (say work) or live outside of coverage then I would say no.

I have a Rogers phone through work.
 
backmarkerducati said:
I didn't even bother setting up WiFi for them at home, just use Freedom's data
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Why wouldn't you put them on WiFi at home? Without it they're probably blowing through tens upon tens of gigs every month on the Freedom network. Yeah, it's unlimited (Although they must notice the throttle once they use their high speed allotment), but I've always been an advocate for not abusing the nice things in life. Freedom gives us "unlimited" data, yeah, but if the option is there to not abuse that privilege, why not take it?

In short, if every single person on their network was using 30 gigs a month on a plan that actually is only supposed to include 10, they may change their mind in the future about the viability of being able to continue to offer these truly unlimited data options. It also adds a lot of unnecessary congestion to the network that negatively effects everyone else who actually legitimately needs that data.

Put your kids on the WiFi when you can. Just MHO.
 
So let me get this straight, I should not use something I paid for because you are worried how it might impact you or someone else???

BTW, some fact checks,
They get 8 GB each phone (on their plans, 5GB plus a bonus 3GB), IF they go over they get put in the penalty box until the end of the billing cycle which dramatically slows their speeds down--so they cannot consume "10's of GBs" in a month... That is how they are doing no overage charges, they use the penalty box as opposed to usage based billing--it is not truly unlimited, it is no overage charges. Neither have consumed the very dramatic 10's of GBs in a month....

My home Internet (which is 300 Gbps on G-PON) is NOT unlimited and I pay for overage, the cap is decent BUT Netfelix etc. consumes cap, even on the STBs. Putting them on the home WiFi likely won't impact wired performance or access network speeds but other in-home devices will be competing for WiFi BW/performance and they will be consuming cap that WILL potentially cost extra $$$$s. We have come close to the cap when everyone is home during the day (school is out).

So why again should I not use what I paid for??? And pay more for something else so you are not impacted???
 
Because this happens when unlimited plans are used outside they way they were intended:

www.google.ca

U.S. wireless carriers claw back unlimited data plans longed for by Canadians

As Canada's telecom regulator considers demands for unlimited wireless data plans, the two largest U.S. carriers are clawing back the freedom
www.google.ca www.google.ca

In short, the carriers take away the perk or dump “fair usage policies” on everyone as a result that place harder limits on how that perk can or can’t be used.

Or they might just decide to castrate the speed even worse to the point where, yeah, you have data still with no overages, but don’t try to do anything aside from check your email with it because it’ll be painfully slow.

So, everyone gets punished for the indiscretions of the few.

With Freedom being one (if not THE) only carrier in Canada who doesn’t charge data overages is something big to be appreciated. I use the feature often because I too may go a gig or so over my monthly allotment on a semi regular basis. But not tens or hundreds over.

And before you say “Yeah, that won’t happen” go read that story I linked to if you didn’t already. It’s happened lots of times, and even though I see unlimited plans creeping into the market again in the USA, I fully expect to see it happen again.

I’m not a cellphone company apologist by any stretch of the imagination, but I also understand the tech enough to know that at the current state of the cellular infrastructure, bandwidth is still a finite resource. One person abusing it effects everyone else, and the carriers get angry phone calls about it, and when they get enough angry customers that start cancelling because of it, they eventually start doing things to solve what’s causing their issue to begin with.

5G will change the playing field dramatically when it arrives, but that’s still quite some time out, and even the carriers will almost undoubtedly try to make a cash cow out of it for the first 5-10 years even when the bandwidth is exponentially expanded.
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