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Email this9:21 am
December 18, 2024
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There are various $15 plans at PM.
Are you on one?
The most recent $15 plan is:
4G, unlimited calling and texting both ways, Canada wide, 100 min LD to 7 countries and 500mb of data
BUT you can replace it before hand, to occur on your next renewal date.
4G, unlimited calling and texting both ways, Canada wide, 1GB of data
So for 20% more you get 500mb more data and no longer will 100 min LD to 7 countries be offered. it's a lose lose proposition. 
10:27 am
December 20, 2016
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What is your overall impression of Public Mobile? Is the coverage reliable outside urban areas? Any shortcomings?
it's a lose lose proposition.
Why is that offer you describe unsatisfactory?
Stephen
11:58 am
December 18, 2024
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Nehpets said
What is your overall impression of Public Mobile? Is the coverage reliable outside urban areas? Any shortcomings?it's a lose lose proposition.
Why is that offer you describe unsatisfactory?
Stephen
Coverage, for me, is good. it's the same as Telus and in the east same as Bell. PM is owned by Telus. I live in greater Vancouver and travel to Victoria, Nanaimo, Whistler to Calgary by car .... all is good. Any dead spots are dead to all carriers so I am happy.
Lose lose ... they have a number of $15 plans because of their sleaziness.
Was on:
100 Minutes Outbound - Canada Wide
Unlimited Inbound Minutes
250 mb Data
Unlimited Texting
Then with no official notice, but brought to my attention through the "community" I changed to as per below at no additional cost
Unlimited Minutes Outbound - Canada Wide
Unlimited Inbound Minutes
100 LD Minutes - 7 Countries
500 mb Data
Unlimited Texting
Then with an OFFICIAL notice by text, was advised of a $3 rate increase staring Oct 30 2025"
So I purchased the new $18 plan as per below vs keeping the old $15 plan that had less data and let the 100 LD minutes go.
Unlimited Minutes Outbound - Canada Wide
Unlimited Inbound Minutes
100 LD Minutes - 7 Countries
1 GB Data
Unlimited Texting
So
500 mb Data - gained
100 LD Minutes - 7 Countries - lost
If one used both of the gain/lost they equal out thus still a $3 increase so the lose lose is lose $3 and lose 100 LD Minutes - 7 Countries
Pretty much every one hates their Telco. And they all have poor customer service. and every one seems to be tightening up closing the holes, charging for what used to be free etc. And PM is all online and some don't like that either, but I can live with that.
I am still happy as their add ons, other than data, don't expire until used up. And over the years they always gave freebies at Christmas and through out the year. And I have a bunch of LD dialling and data (that a I rarely use).
We are retired and have 2 mobile accounts and one land line. Why three numbers for 2 people? Was just in the process of buying and new phone number and will drop one mobile account and replace it with a voip account and expect to see about a $2 bill for it per month.
I can lose the holes too!!! lol. 
if you need any information let me know and check your inbox here.
2:04 pm
February 4, 2017
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If you need babysitting PublicMobile is not for you. They have pretty much non existent customer service. All help is through their forum.
I have 2 phones @ $42 per month(both phones) including tax. No issues in 8 years or more. Love the price!
I do not like the parent company Telus with whom I need to fight with regularly over the "agreement". This is for tv and internet.
2:40 pm
December 20, 2016
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Every Public plan offers various amounts of Public Points. What does $2.00/mo.+ in Public Points mean and how does it work?
I see they offer an eSIM. Can an eSIM be used simultaneously with a physical SIM in the phone, providing two separate phone numbers?
Stephen
3:04 pm
January 25, 2024
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Been with Public M for a few years. Started with $15, 100 minutes outbound, switched to $15, 500MB, calls/sms all unlimited.
I do not need long distance minutes at all. Data? Not really but if it is part of a package, why not.
Current price increase for $15 plans is a plain greed and robbery.
WHO can guarantee you if you switch to current $18, 1GB plan they will not increase it to $22 or more next month just because they can?
As for support, it is by other customers through Community forum (anybody can join, not just PubMob customers).
They do official support but you have to open a ticket and wait until agent (PubMob employee) contacts you through internal mail system. In most cases they are helpful but in some absolutely Not.
Coverage is OK, never had an issue in GTA area.
You do get some kind of rewards they Slashed in half a month or so ago; you currently get 2% of your bill in points, 5 points at anniversary and 1 point for each customer you refer to PubMob. Some people with a lot of referrals have actually free service... You have to manually convert points to $ and to add to your account to be used to pay the bill or buy add-ons.
If you participate in Community (helping others) you might get few points there too. In order to get all 15 points you have to be on-line 24/7 and basically NO LIFE just to get $15/30 days. Only ONE person can get those 15 points. From time to time autopay fails and your bill is Not paid so you are out of service until you or them fix that.
After 90+ days of no pay your account is closed and number lost.
I have no alternative but to stay with them as I need basic service - unlimited calls/sms and nobody offers that for low price. I do not care for Telus' 1 year promo for $120 or about for all unlimited (no data) as it is a PROMO and reading small print they can cancel it at any time (maybe even in the middle of that 1 year). Their regular pre-paid $120 'plan' has only 400 outgoing minutes PER YEAR so good luck when you are stuck waiting for bank/government to pick up a phone...
3:13 pm
November 6, 2018
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We have been with Public Mobile for 7 years with no issues. Public Mobile is a 3rd tier provider so there is no live customer service. You can private message agents if required but their response is not immediate and can take some hours depending on how busy they are. I would not recommend Public Mobile to people who do not feel comfortable dealing with their account online themselves.
The Community Forum is the best place to start if you are having problems or have questions. Knowledgeable PM customers generally answer questions immediately. If they can't help, they will reply with a link for you to directly contact a customer service agent.
PM’s regular plans are well-priced and they usually offer even better plans during sale events. My current subscription is a 5G Canada-US-Mexico plan with 75GB of data for $35 which I nabbed during a sale last year. This plan also includes unlimited talk and text in all 3 countries plus 1000 monthly long-distance minutes to China, Hong Kong, India, Pakistan, Philippines, Taiwan, and the UK. For some people, one of the negatives of PM is that they do not offer roaming packages for any countries other than the US and Mexico.
There are no family plans. If you need more than one phone number, you will need more than one account and a different email address for each account. You can use the same credit card for all accounts though.
When I first subscribed to PM in 2018, their rewards program was much better than it currently is but I'm still a happy customer. Here is a link to PM's Public Points information on their website.
https://www.publicmobile.ca/en/get-help/articles/public-points
3:47 pm
January 11, 2020
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I had this stripped down plan for my son when we needed to get him a phone… I think I’m going to explore freedom mobile..They had the same plan as public on sale for 10 bucks a month a while back so that’s what I got. My second son on …might be worth sniffing around for those that wanna stripped down bare bones plan
They also have a pledge to never increase the monthly rate as long as you stay on the same plan.
And like public mobile, you’re not committed to a plan 30 days notice in you’re out.
4:08 pm
December 18, 2024
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mmlt said
If you need babysitting PublicMobile is not for you. They have pretty much non existent customer service. All help is through their forum.I have 2 phones @ $42 per month(both phones) including tax. No issues in 8 years or more. Love the price!
I do not like the parent company Telus with whom I need to fight with regularly over the "agreement". This is for tv and internet.
lol. And let's say that Telus is full service. Do you consider the baby sitting service that they offer to be 1. Good, 2. Poor, 3. A PITA
4:14 pm
December 18, 2024
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Nehpets said
Every Public plan offers various amounts of Public Points. What does $2.00/mo.+ in Public Points mean and how does it work?I see they offer an eSIM. Can an eSIM be used simultaneously with a physical SIM in the phone, providing two separate phone numbers?
Stephen
So every plan offers 2% in points (1 point = $1 so far) and I guess you were looking at a $40 plan with the current 5% back. You can use that money to buy "add ons" or cash in 15 points for a $15 bill credit. And just FYI they always use your balance before using your credit card that is on your profile.
I use the $15 for a bill credit.
Points are from referrals, anniversary, community participation and the 5% of bill payments.
Esim = one and only one phone number
Sim = one and only one phone number
You may have a phone with Esim and a SIM slot. So you can have 2 Sims in a phone.
And I believe you can be on 2 calls at once...but one call would be on hold.
My preference is a SIM and that way you can move it phone to phone.
Their eSIMS seem to have issues.
New version of points and values etc.
No family plans as mentioned. And you need an email address per plan or use email alias's.
4:20 pm
December 18, 2024
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CAD said
Been with Public M for a few years. Started with $15, 100 minutes outbound, switched to $15, 500MB, calls/sms all unlimited.
I do not need long distance minutes at all. Data? Not really but if it is part of a package, why not.
Current price increase for $15 plans is a plain greed and robbery.WHO can guarantee you if you switch to current $18, 1GB plan they will not increase it to $22 or more next month just because they can?
As for support, it is by other customers through Community forum (anybody can join, not just PubMob customers).
They do official support but you have to open a ticket and wait until agent (PubMob employee) contacts you through internal mail system. In most cases they are helpful but in some absolutely Not.
Coverage is OK, never had an issue in GTA area.You do get some kind of rewards they Slashed in half a month or so ago; you currently get 2% of your bill in points, 5 points at anniversary and 1 point for each customer you refer to PubMob. Some people with a lot of referrals have actually free service... You have to manually convert points to $ and to add to your account to be used to pay the bill or buy add-ons.
If you participate in Community (helping others) you might get few points there too. In order to get all 15 points you have to be on-line 24/7 and basically NO LIFE just to get $15/30 days. Only ONE person can get those 15 points. From time to time autopay fails and your bill is Not paid so you are out of service until you or them fix that.
After 90+ days of no pay your account is closed and number lost.I have no alternative but to stay with them as I need basic service - unlimited calls/sms and nobody offers that for low price. I do not care for Telus' 1 year promo for $120 or about for all unlimited (no data) as it is a PROMO and reading small print they can cancel it at any time (maybe even in the middle of that 1 year). Their regular pre-paid $120 'plan' has only 400 outgoing minutes PER YEAR so good luck when you are stuck waiting for bank/government to pick up a phone...
Take a look at Freedoms annual plans.
7:25 pm
August 4, 2010
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FWIW, before 2023 I was a long-term Koodo customer. I was on an ancient plan with just a few GB of data, a bad deal compared to their in-market plans at the time. They wouldn't offer me their 2023 Black Friday pricing as an existing customer, so I became a former customer, and switched to Public Mobile. $34 for a 40GB 5G plan, on the same Telus towers as Koodo. No WiFi calling, if that is a concern. Their monthly (prepaid) charge isn't done as a recurring VISA charge, so I sacrifice the extra 80 cents on my TD Visa cashback. I've had no real complaints in my two years with PM. I'm generally not a heavy user of cellular data. As mentioned, the customer service is mainly online/email, aside from an annoying double-billing of my first signup charge, haven't had to interact with them.
Somewhere in the first year I noticed that I could upgrade within their app at no extra charge to a 50GB Canada-US plan, and did. That came in very handy later in 2024 when I was in the US - both the minutes and data roamed pretty seamlessly, and my travel companion was very jealous. Earlier this year I upped by $1 to $35 for 75GB of data. That's an order of magnitude more than my modest usual monthly needs, but it is a cheap emergency insurance policy against internet outages during work-from-home, or for other cases where making my phone a personal hotspot. My minutes/roaming now extends to Mexico, and I get 1000 long distance minutes to the UK and 6 Asian countries (you'd have to buy a pack of Intl minutes to call other countries), neither of which I use. It is basically their $50 80GB Can/US/Mexico plan, for $35. Their points plan was giving me a $15 bill credit over about a year, although they are about to halve the point accumulation.
Having WiFi (VOLTE) calling available would be nice in a checklist sort of way, but I didn't need it at Koodo and haven't needed it with PM. I see some of Freedom's plans include full international roaming for a portion of data (and sometimes minutes) on some plans ("Roam Beyond"), which I can see would have been attractive back in the days when I did more international vacationing.
6:35 am
January 25, 2024
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GIC-Fanatic said
Take a look at Freedoms annual plans.
Thank you! $129 plan looks very attractive.
6:52 am
November 18, 2017
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e-SIMS are a terrible idea. Because they can be changed, they DO get changed and criminals clone a target's phone to take control of whatever accounts the phone access. Stick with a SIMple physical SIM you can keep, transfer or remove securely.
RetirEd
10:07 am
December 20, 2019
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BillieBob said
My current subscription is a 5G Canada-US-Mexico plan with 75GB of data for $35 which I nabbed during a sale last year.
Yeah, I have the same plan, best time is always black friday and the year before I had $34 for the same plan less the Mexico part with 60gb. Then black friday came and for $1 I added mexico and 15gb and oddly enough I traveled to mexico right after.
So I pay $39.55 tax in for that plan and I have 6 other family members on the same plan. Funny part is all the bonus data carries over so it actually shows 89gb in my account.
Love Public, never had an issue, one always gets the best price if you're lucky enough to check in on Black Friday and Boxing Day.
10:42 am
April 27, 2017
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RetirEd said
e-SIMS are a terrible idea. Because they can be changed, they DO get changed and criminals clone a target's phone to take control of whatever accounts the phone access. Stick with a SIMple physical SIM you can keep, transfer or remove securely.
The risks are slightly different but physical SIMs are just as safe/vulnerable. Criminals can transfer your number to a different SIM even if they don’t get their hands on it or clone physical SIMs if they do.
eSIMs are more convenient though.
7:17 pm
December 12, 2009
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Koodo Mobile did something similar. I moved to the non-advertised $149+tax/year plan which includes 30 GB of 4G data per year, unlimited SMS/MMS messaging to/from anyone anywhere in the world, and unlimited Canada-wide calling. 
7:43 am
December 18, 2024
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CAD said
GIC-Fanatic said
Take a look at Freedoms annual plans.Thank you! $129 plan looks very attractive.
You’re welcome. While I plan to stick with PM for now, Freedom will be my second choice. And this is a bonus below is something to keep in mind.
7:54 am
December 18, 2024
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KamWest said
BillieBob said
My current subscription is a 5G Canada-US-Mexico plan with 75GB of data for $35 which I nabbed during a sale last year.Yeah, I have the same plan, best time is always black friday and the year before I had $34 for the same plan less the Mexico part with 60gb. Then black friday came and for $1 I added mexico and 15gb and oddly enough I traveled to mexico right after.
So I pay $39.55 tax in for that plan and I have 6 other family members on the same plan. Funny part is all the bonus data carries over so it actually shows 89gb in my account.
Love Public, never had an issue, one always gets the best price if you're lucky enough to check in on Black Friday and Boxing Day.
@KamWest
Just to clarify, your plan is with PM? And Boxing Day sale was on the true Black Friday (the Friday just after the American Thanksgiving)?
PM has some good unpublished deals…and can either check in “Change Subscription” which I try to stay out of or in the “Community” of which I have all email notifications turned off.
I would like to watch for the Black Friday though.
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