Presuming you are the average Canadian consumer of wireless services, in all likelihood your mobile phone was provided to you by a telecomm company on a subsidized contracted service plan. In that case, who actually owns your phone? I ask the question because recent announcements by the big three (Rogers, Bell and Telus) would have you believe that they own your phone and for a very ‘reasonable’ fee (ranging from a low of $35 from Telus, $50 with Rogers and on to a high of $75 with Bell) they will now unlock your phone. I believe all of these carriers will only unlock a subsidized phone once you are 90 days into your contract. And if you own an iphone that you had subsidized by a carrier? Well, you better have finished paying off the thing and be off contract if you hope to unlock that sucker.
you own your phone. It’s no different than signing a ‘buy now pay later’ contract for furniture
Speaking of suckers…why would you pay so much and what can the carrier do about it if you unlock your phone earlier or through another method rather than paying the carrier such an exorbitant fee?
First, let me state one thing up front. When you sign a contract with a telecomm carrier, you now own your telephone handset. Sure, it may be subsidized and you may be paying back for the phone through your contract over time, but you own your phone. It’s no different than signing a ‘buy now pay later’ contract for furniture. From the moment you walk out of the store with that contract in hand, you own it. And much like the furniture store can’t tell you what you can do with your new furniture once you get it home neither can the telecomm carrier tell you what you can or cannot do with your new phone. They may not have to facilitate changes you want to make, but they sure can’t stop you.
If you unlock your phone and think you can just walk away while you are still in your contract period with one of the big carriers, think again. That contract has a cancellation fee. The fee can be quite a hefty one too, depending on the value of the handset they sold to you. Because make no mistake about it – you are going to pay for that phone. This is the exact reason why it’s ridiculous for the carrier to make it seem as though you shouldn’t be allowed to unlock your phone. They act as if they still own it. But they don’t – you do. But beware, if you choose to default on your contract, they can and will ruin your credit rating and that can cost you a lot more than the price of a phone over the long run.
Second, why do the carriers want you to pay them so much to unlock your phone? Because it’s a money-making endeavour for them! $75 to give you a code that you can pay $10 for online – and those online guys are still making money off that. What kind of profit does that mean for the big carriers? That was a rhetorical question of course. We all know what kind of profit these guys are making across the board. The only caveat I would have on this is that the online unlock services don’t offer codes for every phone with every carrier. So do your research first – it may be that getting the carrier to unlock your phone is your only (sadly) option.
When I sat down to write this post, I went looking for the big three carriers’ unlock policies, just to confirm that what I’ve been reading online is true. Neither Bell nor Rogers appear to have their policies available through the website. Telus policy is there but is raises more questions than it answers in my view. Why so why telecomm carriers? If it’s your policy, just publish it already! If there are variables associated, put up a grid. You can do that to sell us the phone, surely it can’t be harder to sell us your unlock services?
In reality, I would recommend that everyone just buy an unlocked phone outright. However, your options to do so are basically limited to the Google Nexus or the iPhone from the Apple store (and be sure to verify they are selling you an ‘unlocked’ iphone not just simply one that is a ‘non-carrier locked’ phone. Because apparently the latter type actually do lock in to the first carrier on which service is entered into. Bizarre but true.
Or as I said in my roaming guide for Canadians travelling to the U.S. – don’t let the carriers threaten you with the voided warranty nonsense. Take the chance, find an online unlock service that has good reviews, pay your money and let them send you the unlock code for your phone. That’s my key message here – it is your phone.