prepaid sim phone in vancouver

I need in Vancouver a cell number, a sim card i want to buy at airport, to put in my cell phone
i need it just for some text and local calls outcoming and incoming, so simplest and cheapest.
can anyone suggest me something?
I read about petro canada, is there something else?
i am not resident in canada

 

7-11

 

There's going to the convenient store (7 Eleven)
Fido, Rogers, etc. I'm pretty sure at the airport you can buy a simcard at their quick stores.

Texting is going to cost $0.15 per sending out. Local calls well it'll be deducted each time you use the phone, incoming are also at your own expense.

 

Just be aware that while 7-11's SpeakOutWireless and Petro Canada are pretty cheap, they do NOT allow you to buy just a SIM card to put in your phone. You have to buy a phone and then take the SIM out. The cheapest phones run about $50-75.

If you want to avoid buying a phone, your main options are Rogers, Fido, Bell or Telus. I wouldn't worry about prices, they're all about the same with Fido probably being the most flexible and easy to use. These carriers allow you to purchase the SIM separately, but you'll have to go to an authorized retailer. I don't know if they have them at the airport but I suspect the 7-11 there would at least carry Fido ones.

Be wary of third party retailers that try to rip you off. These are the prices from the official stores:

• Bell - $5.00
• Fido - $9.99
• Rogers - $9.99
• Telus - $9.99

Another option is to buy a SIM off somebody on Craigslist. For Petro and Seven Eleven SIMs, look here: http://www.speakoutwireless.ca/speak/

For more information on the type of prepaid plans (also called Pay As You Go over here) you can get, check out these sites:

• http://www.telusmobility.com/en/BC/prepaid/rates.shtml
• http://www.bell.ca/shopping/PrsShpWls_PrepaidPlans.page
• http://www.fido.ca/web/content/prepaid/prepaid_airtime_rates
• http://www.rogers.com/web/Rogers.portal?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=WRLS_PREPAID_LANDING

 

I must warn against Fido.

I found their service very expensive, and their tech support (polite but) extremely confused. In the end I got ripped off, with a phone that does only part of what I paid for, and has several times cut out when I needed it.

They only accept credit cards with a Canadian billing address for re-filling the account. If you can find a Fido store, you can buy vouchers for more time there. But for me this became unworkable, just when I needed to use the phone.

I also spent money for g3 service with my pre-paid card. They even turned the service on. I checked my e-mail once, and found the money in my account had disappeared. I talked to their tech support, put in more money, tried again, and found again the money disappeared. After about 2 hours talking to various tech support people, they concluded that their policy did not allow the combination of pre-paid SIM cards and g3 data.

Great. "OK what plan does allow g3 service?" "Monthly plan? OK, I'm only here a few days, but sure give me the monthly service." "No problem: give us your credit card and we'll do a credit check."..."Oh, sir, we can accept only credit cards with a Canadian billing address." "But I'm a visitor. I don't have a Canadian credit card--what can we do?" "I'm sorry, I can't see what we can do." "But I paid for g3 access! I'm sorry sir, I really can't help you."

Also, they misspelled my name when they first registered me, and have been unable to change the misspelling. The web site has no obvious means of fixing this.

Neither their sales people and tech people really know what is going on. And it is obvious that middle management hasn't thoroughly thought out who their customers are. This is a mess.

Now somebody has informed me that Fido is owned by Rogers, and has absorbed some of the big company's hideously chaotic corporate culture. I had already been warned before I got here to avoid this big company, and didn't read enough...