Blackberry Messenger...In the US??

[Louiepipbgeeco]

Hi my DD has a BB and wants to be able to talk to use it for Blackberry msging while we are in the US for March Break. What should I add to her phone if this is the only thing she intends on using???

 

[dave 2]

BBerry messenger works very well. We used it both times and plan to use it again (this Thursday!). We are with Telus and add the US data plan for 10$ a month for 1 month. Messenger does not use much data so doesn't cost us more than the 10$.

 

[lizzyb]

When I used BBM while in the US I got charged alot for roaming.

 

[1novascotian]

BBM is part of the data plan, and you are definitely going to want to check out data rates for use in the states. VERY expensive. I have a smart phone and am leaving mine at home when I go in May.

 

[1novascotian]

BBerry messenger works very well. We used it both times and plan to use it again (this Thursday!). We are with Telus and add the US data plan for 10$ a month for 1 month. Messenger does not use much data so doesn't cost us more than the 10$.

I would double check that if I were you, I am with telus and the way I understood it was you pay the $10 for the month and that reduces the cost of your data to $1 per MB

 

[dave 2]

I did before our last trip (Xmas 09) and made sure I didn't download email images and not opening emails. Just used BBM and cost was 10$ extra. That's it. I called earlier tonight to set it up again and 10$ rate will drop after 30 days automatically. There are also US roaming plans for calling but we won't be using our phones unless in emergency.

 

[Louiepipbgeeco]

Is it $10 for the roaming etc. as well when using the BBM

 

[mom4463]

I would double check that if I were you, I am with telus and the way I understood it was you pay the $10 for the month and that reduces the cost of your data to $1 per MB

You are correct. When we went away last week, I purchased the $10 for the month with the $1 per MB, but I was advised by salesperson at Telus to tell her to only use this feature rarely because it could get really expensive. I paid the $10 for the month but told my dd to basically only use it with my permission. I also purchased the $20 for the month of unlimited texting in the US and she used this for the week.

 

[CR Resort Fan 4 Life]

I did before our last trip (Xmas 09) and made sure I didn't download email images and not opening emails. Just used BBM and cost was 10$ extra. That's it. I called earlier tonight to set it up again and 10$ rate will drop after 30 days automatically. There are also US roaming plans for calling but we won't be using our phones unless in emergency.

I don't use BlackBerry Messenger, however with my plan I am not charged any roaming fees if I open an e-mail that is sent to me while I am in the United States. If I send an e-mail from my BlackBerry when I am down there then I get charged roaming.

 

[Louiepipbgeeco]

I was in the Rogers store last night and they said BBM was free ?? That it is not internet nor text and they work between the bb phones and it was no charge

 

[KerriMc]

Louie - BBM is free here in Canada ... but not in the US. I was just down last month in PA for a hockey tournament and added the $10 data roaming plan with Rogers. I didn't use a smigden and I used it quite a bit actually!! I had a hard time getting it to work right away - actually had to call Rogers to have it reset or something ... so I had a couple of hockey parents text me and that dinged me a bit as the texting wasn't covered.

I bought a 15 min phone time and the data plan ... I wish they had a combination pkg for BB that you could by data / text / phone time for some flat rate - especially for those of us that really only carry it to use if need be.

Oh well ... data is set to drop off at the end of this month (as we need it next week) and the minutes I'm going to call and add once more.

 

[Louiepipbgeeco]

Thanks....but I am confused now...the sales ladies both said in the US to Canada and vice versa it would be ee...her plan has unlimited BBM Could that be why?? Now I am really confused...
Will have to contact Rogers again.
Thanks for your information

 

[A&CsMom]

I stopped by the Rogers kiosk at my local mall today (Ontario) to ask about bbming with my husband while we are in Florida this month and was told not to put a US plan on my phone just for bbming because it would only cost me $5-10 extra as it doesn't use a lot of whatever it uses, but I should be careful not to surf, text or use the phone because that will cost me a lot. But he assured me just bbming would not add much to my bill.

 

[bdtracey]

DW has an older BB Curve and an iPhone 3Gs. I have a newer BB Curve. We're thinking about taking both BB's down so we can BBM each other. The inlaws, however, each have iPhones and we would like to communicate with them somehow. Is there an app that will allow us to use our data plans to IM between BB's and iPhones?

The way I understand it, we all need to pay the $10 to get the US data plan and then we can IM each other. If we accidentally SMS text each other then we're really going to get dinged...right?

 

[CR Resort Fan 4 Life]

DW has an older BB Curve and an iPhone 3Gs. I have a newer BB Curve. We're thinking about taking both BB's down so we can BBM each other. The inlaws, however, each have iPhones and we would like to communicate with them somehow. Is there an app that will allow us to use our data plans to IM between BB's and iPhones?

The way I understand it, we all need to pay the $10 to get the US data plan and then we can IM each other. If we accidentally SMS text each other then we're really going to get dinged...right?

I am with Bell and whenever I am in the United States I always purchase a US texting plan that only charges me 25 cents instead of 75 cents. Now I am not sure which company you are with, however with a texting plan like that you can send them to the people who have iPhones.

 

[blizzard]

I was told the other day that BBM is free north america wide. However, BBM works through your data plan, so you must have data turned on, which means that your phone will download email, etc. which WILL incur roaming charges. I suppose you could turn off your email by removing the email settings, and then be sure not to use your phone for browsing. (Browsing is probably the biggest data roaming cost)

In practicality, what we do is just use BBM, let it download email (but never retrieve attachments), and never browse, and it costs us less than $10 additional per trip for data roaming. The last trip I believe my husband either used his browser and/or sent email and the data roaming was $40, so if you think you may want to use these features you should get the $10 US plan for peace of mind.

 

[tinytink22]

I'm with Koodo, and to use my bbm in the states I'm only charged $5 for roaming in the US.

 

[Louiepipbgeeco]

Okay I have talked To Rogers again and keep hearing conflicting info...so my understanding is that if she were to only use BBM than it would not be charged roaming?? or it is so small??the amt.?

 

[dishguy1977]

Wow...a lot of misinformation and confusion here and I will do my best to try and clear it up.

So first off, BBM is "free" to use in the US in that there are no "long distance" charges or additional charges for using BBM worldwide. Unlike texting it doesnt matter where you or the person who you are BBM'ing with are located as it just uses data (in other words an internet conection).

BUT...you do have to pay for that data (internet connection) connection that BBM uses and when you are in the states the data used does not come out of your regular data plan bucket and you are charged separately for it.

Now BBM itself does not use alot of data as it is just mostly text and RIM compresses it quite effeciently. HOWEVER, if your data connection is turned on while in the US (in order to use BBM it has to be on) than your Blackberry is going to go about it's normal business and use data for other applications just like it normally would and this is where it can add up to significant amounts. I'm talking about applications that you may have running in the background like weather apps that periodically update and use data without user intervention. Email as well can be bad depending on how it is setup and if it is constantly "syncing" in order to update calendars or address books or just receiving tons of emails on multiple accounts. Usually you have to specifially tell it to download attachments and pictures but it is possible in some cases to have it setup so all this downloading is happening automatically.

The $10 add on several people have mentioned is great and reduces your US data charges to about $1/mb which is relatively cheap and pretty much lets you use your blackberry as you normally would.

As others have mentioned, they may have used BBM in the US without any special add ons and only been charged a few dollars. This can work because as I mentioned previously BBM itself does not use a lot of data at all but you just have to watch out for all the other things on your BB using data at the same time.

Clear as mud?

 

[dave 2]

We just arrived (3AM this morning) and I checked my Telus ebill which came in yesterday. We were charged the 10$ extra for US data plan plus a grand total of 33 cents extra for data. We only used BBM between us and a few emails back home. We didn't open emails which load images.

For the convenience, this is the best way to communicate.