Prepaid Voice + Flex Data?

[diav]

Hi there,

Forgive me if this seems incredibly newbie-ish, but I purchased an unlocked iPhone 4 for full price in the US back in August. I'm currently using Fido's prepaid service of $10/month (30 cents per minute); I've actually been using this since 2003 and never really felt the need to switch over to a monthly plan. Currently, I'm just buying $10 prepaid vouchers every month from the Fido kiosks and just putting in the money via the Fido site before the expiry date.

However, I am considering getting a (flex) data add-on (either $10 for 100MB or $25 for 500MB). Unless there are other options, I'll also take them into consideration since I don't want to sign a contract and those two are the only ones listed on Fido's site for data add-ons.

Would it be possible for me to keep the prepaid $10/month and have a monthly data add-on? Or would I have to switch over to a monthly voice plan first to get the data add-on (so everything will be billed monthly)? I'm actually not too sure about which department I'd have to call, so if anyone can give me some advice, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Thanks!

[FidoStephane · Accepted solution]

Hi there diav

Sorry for the delay in our reply,

You may indeed add one of the two data options you mentioned, however the cost of the option must be activated in your account before the option is added. Therefore 10$ would not be enough

let's say you wanted 10$ worth of airtime + 10$/ 100 MBs of data, you would need to add a 20$ voucher minimum.

If you wanted to migrate to a monthly service, you may do so without activating a contract, by contacting us.  

Hope that helps, 

[ateichman]

I'm currently trying out the $10/mo. plan on an unlocked iPhone. I, too, am happy with prepaid and only need occasional data.

What I am not happy about is that Fido seems to track data in a very different fashion than does my iPhone. I'm going by the iPhone's internal reckoning of how much data is sent and received - the numbers you find by digging into the usage panel in the settings app of the iPhone.

Comparing the iPhone's own figures with the figures generated by Fido and available through the usage page on their website, Fido's number is much higher. In other words, Fido "clocks" far more data than the phone thinks it has sent and received. Since resetting my phone to match the Fido amount 2 days ago, Fido thinks I have sent/received about 90% more data than the phone does. Hmmm... I just spent some time on the phone with a customer service rep, and although she tried very hard to be helpful, it really was a case of the blind leading the blind. She explained, for instance, that every email was 2MB in size...

As an aside, if anyone on here can point me to a coherent explanation of how Fido calculates data, I'd appreciate it. It's almost as though everything, no matter how small, counts as a MB, or something similar. If I can understand the system, perhaps I can work with it, but right now it's a mystery.

Anyhow, the point of this post is that, currently at least, Fido's idea of 100MB and your idea of 100MB is likely to be way off. Don't plan to run your add-on close to the line, or you will be paying a good chunk of overage charges each month. Maybe this will improve in future, who knows?

If I can't figure this out to my satisfaction by the end of this month, I will be cancelling my add-on and going back to data passes. It's not as convenient (although you can keep the URL for purchasing the pass as a bookmark on your home screen for quick access), but it's better than being over-billed.

[ateichman]

Update on my previous post:

Now my phone and Fido are reporting within 1MB of each other, which is much more reasonable. In fact, for a while a few days ago, my phone was reporting slightly more data usage than Fido.

I'd still like to know how Fido counts data and why it bounces around like this, and will continue monitoring usage throughout the month. It's hard to play the game when you don't know the rules.