Mobile Mafia

Since returning to Canada, one of the items on our to-do list that has been plaguing our minds is dealing with cell phones. From the Blackberry to the iPhone, we've considered it all. Not sure what it is ultimately going to boil down to, but in the end, Bob and I can agree on one thing: the Mobile Mafia in Canada is EVIL. They (Rogers, Fido, Bell, you name it) are sucking the money right out of Canadians' pockets. They're downright mean.


We brought home a Blackberry a few days ago and have spent the past few days learning about it and getting to know our good friend - Rogers.

The things we love about Rogers:

We love it that Rogers gives us the capability to view 6,000 web pages a month on our Blackberry, but the phone doesn't have the capability to open most web pages (we've successfully opened 2 pages in total). We love it that we are paying Rogers money for something our device can't do. We love it how they didn't tell us this when we got the damn thing.

We love it that, even though our monthly plan for one phone amounts to nearly as much as a car payment, it still only gives us 7 minutes a day of "free" local calling and incoming calls. We love it that the "evenings and weekends" time is now from 9 p.m. onwards, rather than the old standard 6 p.m. We especially love it that Rogers will charge us 30 cents a minute for long distance calls, including when people from out of town call us.

We love it when we go to the itty bitty Rogers store on Robson St. and it is jammed full of people and only 3 sales staff. We love it when the sales reps give us a sales pitch for one of their phones and don't have any in stock for us to see. We love it too when we call the office and ask for help regarding our plan and they tell us it's not their department. We really love it when we call the 1-800 number to clarify questions and we get to talk to the automated fake computer girl and then sit on hold for 20 minutes, and never get through to a real person.

We love Rogers. It's our new best friend here in Canada. We love being taken advantage of and having the money stolen right out of our pockets.

We think this is the start of a great new relationship. :)

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Musique du jour: Sarah Vaughan - Mean to Me

News du jour: Newfoundland Taxi Charm in Toronto (we love the idea!)