Rogers Communications Inc. will be providing a service that will allow Canadians to use their wireless data and call plans while in the US for $5 per day. The service, known as “Roam Like Home” will launch on Monday.
The telecommunications company launched the service in response to criticism about its high roaming fees while abroad.
From Monday customers with a Rogers Share Everything plan can call, text, surf the web, and send emails in the US as if they were in Canada.
CEO Guy Laurence said:
“We said, as Rogers, we would improve things… for our customers. And every journey starts with a single step. This is the first step in a series of initiatives that we will roll out over the coming months, quarters and years,”
The move by Rogers comes at a time when its market share is at risk by the likes of BCE Inc. and Telus Corp. Telus gained 113,000 new wireless subscribers in the third quarter and Bell gained 91,000 subscribers. Rogers, on the other hand, only gained 11,700 new wireless subscribers.
In terms of customer service, Rogers has also been performing badly. Rogers had 261 complaints per million people, compared to Telus’s 76 per million complaints.
Mr. Laurence knows that customer service is something that the company needs to work on. In May he said the company would be restructured and its customer service experience would be improved.
He said that this new initiative Roam Like Home has been in development since early 2014 and was created because of feedback from customers. The company made a deal with the American telecom giant AT&T for roaming rates.
