Wi-Fi Calling: Can you use it outside Canada?

[Hmmmisme]

With Rogers, you can use wifi-calling when connected to a wifi access point and make (Canada or Canada local) calls without incurring any long distance charges. If anyone calls your cell while you're connected to wifi calling, it will be treated like a local incoming call.

Reading Telus and Bell's FAQ, they say that wifi calling is only for Canada. Does that mean that Telus blocks their ports when you're (trying) to use the  wifi calling feature outside Canada, eg. USA?

[NFtoBC · Accepted solution]

Yes, only from Canadian IP addresses. I guess you could connect through a VPN.

[MattyCjD]

Correct on Telus only being within Canada (recently tested this as well).

I am rather disappointed that Rogers offers this service outside of Canada, along with their "Roam Like Home" being cheaper per day as well. I'm sure my account is flagged with the number of "they offer this, why don't you" phone calls 😛

[BillTelusCust]

Telus has dozens more countries than Rogers does for "roam like home" vs. Easy Roam.  Telus also has a Canada/USA plan, Rogers I don't think does.  But you're right, I wish Telus allowed wi fi calling outside of Canada.

[Dwayne888]

There is no sound logical reason to why Bell and Telus block your IP for Wi-Fi calling outside Canada. It's so handy, but most importantly Rogers has it too. That being said, users on Rogers report occasional issues with Wi-Fi calling such as texts not sent or received.

This feature though is still in it's infancy and not many people know it even exists, nevermind available. When I even bring up Wi-Fi calling, some carrier reps say they use a third party app for that...and then they suggest an app like WeChat, WhatsApp, or Line. These apps are not an example of Wi-Fi calling, but I see the flaw in their thinking. 

[BillTelusCust]

Well, I actually have iPhones on both Telus and Rogers, so I have a VERY GOOD and constant comparison of the features of both.  The coverage Telus has where I go in Canada has pretty good coverage, so I am seldom using "Telus Wi-Fi" but it is great when I do have it.  There's one place I do go in Canada where the coverage isn't the best and there's a good Wi-FI signal, so it is a great feature.  That said, there are a LOT of places I go internationally where I would want to use Wi-Fi calling - the MANY places in the USA where the coverage isn't so good, or the towers aren't programmed very well (yes, that's been happening for 20+ years but getting better) as well as overseas places.  Telus is dead in the water with this stuff as far as Wi-Fi calling out of the country and it is an annoyance.  Anyone who is telling me to "use other apps" is not being helpful.  Everybody uses a phone.  Everybody doesn't use the same app.  Furthermore, multi factor authentication sends texts to your cell phone, not an "app".

As far as Rogers is concerned, their wi-fi calling seems to work just fine.  I have not experienced issues with it, but probably most of my texts are imessage, so I don't have good data on texts.  If you're on a Shaw hot spot, the wi fi calling can be a problem because many of the "Shaw Go" sites are pretty slow, that's getting better bit by bit.

All in all, Telus have picked up their socks with number of countries roaming with the Easy Roam, but it is difficult to excuse the lack of Wi-Fi calling out of the country.  There's no legal basis that I know of since Rogers does it, and although some countries don't like it, is that really Telus' problem?  If it is then there are tools available to deal with that.

[Dwayne888]

You bring up a good point about multi-factor authentication. That's where Rogers has occasional issues when using Wi-Fi calling. They may have fixed things recently but I often called Rogers tech support on behalf of my friends/colleagues who have had issues sending and receiving text. The issue according to advanced level Rogers tech support wasn't isolated to one particular brand of device eg. Samsung, iPhone. 

Another thing to remember about Wi-Fi calling is that even though you may be in a good coverage area, you might be indoors, basement, or underground you might be in a dead spot but you're fine if you have a Wi-Fi access point. 

Even with these Easy Roam type plans, there's been recent reports, at least on Koodo forums how there is "data leakage" or "phantom data" that triggers the daily charge of roaming. While you can contact customer service to get the amount credited if you charged erroneously by the phantom 0.01 MB of data, it's still a hassle and an easy money grab by the provider. 

I recall Shaw Wi-Fi used to be fast when it came out years ago, then their network started to become congested with people sharing email addresses and password. Fortunately, I am seeing more merchants having #Telus Wi-Fi hot spots. 

[BillTelusCust]

As I said, I don't have good data on the texts, nor am I likely to.  I use the Telus phone for all MFA.

The lower floor of a place my mother has is where I get to experience Wi-Fi calling, and at a couple of work sites.  At home, I have very strong bars both carriers even in the basement.  Interesting to note, Rogers goes to Wi-Fi calling whenever it can, Telus goes to Wi-Fi calling when it has to.

I've done some testing as to the Shaw sites, as the "congestion story" is the same old excuse.  I've gone to Shaw hot spots where there is very very likely next to no one on them and still they are less than a megabit, and they give excuses when it is reported.  They are getting better but something technical was slowing them down, and not necessarily congestion.  I've been watching/measuring this for a couple of years! It is getting better, slowly. Hint:  If you have an iPhone, only use the Hotspot 2.0 and you'll only connect to the newer ones, is my best guess.

Telus seems to run their hotspots with better speed consistency.

We have public wi-fi in a lot of places, but what we need more now is upgraded wi fi.

As for the "data leakage when roaming", when I am roaming I generally have not had this issue but I only have SIM cards in iPhones and an iPad.  I put the device in airplane mode and then turn on wi fi, and that's worked for me.  I make sure to have the wi fi assist off as a matter of policy.

[Dwayne888]

No need to get defensive. Hehe. I was just emphasizing that Rogers Wi-Fi calling isn't perfect. 

Since you mentioned Hotspot 2.0, I thought I would mention that there's a bug with Shaw Passpoint Wi-Fi where some people can no longer connect to it after updating to iOS 11.x.  Shaw is telling people to use "Shaw Open" until the bug is fixed. In any event, it's quite ridiculous they rolled out Shaw Passpoint for iPhone users only. North Americans tend to prefer iPhones but elsewhere it's other brands like Samsung, Oppo, Huawei and more running on the Android OS.

[BillTelusCust]

Interesting.  I was using Shaw Passpoint 2.0 today (and got 30 megs down on it like I am supposed to), so I guess I am not getting that problem. I'm on iOS 11.2.1 - I will keep a better eye on it, thank you for pointing it out.  I agree that it should roll out for more devices....computers, phones, tablets.  They should have, in my opinion, tested all of them before they rolled it out.

[Dwayne888]

You know what's even more interesting. On my wife's iPhone she can still access Passpoint. But after I updated my iPhone, I lost access to it. Here's the thread from Shaw' Forums:  https://community.shaw.ca/thread/37104

[BillTelusCust]

I am getting tired just reading it!

The solution is always the same, no idea what the problem is, so tear each and every thing down on your phone and reset it, then see if it does anything. I hate that.

Good luck and I hope it doesn't become more widespread  No problems with Telus hot spots though I imagine...

[Dwayne888]

Just an update. I was in Asia for several weeks recently. I was using a VPN and I was able to use wifi calling only when my VPN was enabled and connected to a Canadian server. East coast servers worked best (faster connectivity to wifi calling).

[BillTelusCust]

That is interesting, thank you for posting it.,  Can you say if it was an android or iPhone?   Someone else had said it failed with theirs, so I wondered what type of phone you are using.

[Trident]

Were you billed extra for using wifi calling while connected to VPN? Also, did you set up VPN connection on the phone or on the router ?