SCOPE TESTS THE FIDO CELLULAR TELEPHONE SYSTEM

By Harold Merton

Microcell Solutions Inc. (a subsidiary of parent company Microcell Telecommunications Inc.) launched Fido PCS service on November 28, 1996.

Microcell has built their Personal Communications Services (PCS) network based on the Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) protocol. The technology is a little different than that used by other cellular suppliers in Canada and gives cellular customers some features that we feel are very beneficial especially the use of a 'Smart card' to store information.

Operating under the Fido name, Microcell is primarily a 'big city' digital technology cellular phone service that concentrates its coverage within a specific city's geographical area rather than trying to build their coverage area out from where they already exist, taking in rural areas between big cities. There is also a concentration along major traffic corridors like Highway 401.

As an example, the digital Fido coverage area near our offices in London, Ontario ends just a short distance west of our location, because we are on the extreme west side of the city.

In order to assist their big city customers, Fido has an arrangement with another cellular service provider to offer analogue cellular service (in areas where Fido does not have digital service) through a special add-on module that fits on some of their phones. Fido customers can carry these modules in their vehicles for quick use when necessary. They use their normal phone arrangement in Fido's area but have an alternative for service when they leave it.

When you know you are going to be leaving Fido's coverage area, you simply slip on the analogue module and the phone then connects to the Bell Cellular network. If you return to Fido's digital coverage area later, the phone automatically switches back to the Fido network.

One of the main attractions to Fido's cellular service has been its economical long distance rates. For just 10 cents a minute any time of the day, customers can call anywhere in Canada or the United States. They can even opt for Fido's residential long distance plan at the same rate and all charges appear on the Fido customer's invoice. By April of last year Fido had attracted about one million Canadian customers with what they refer to as their 'fair and clear' marketing plans.

This publication has previously featured at least two other cellular telephone services so when we received a special notification from the Royal Bank about a program with Fido we thought they might be another possibility for our readers to consider when buying cellular telephone service.

Royal Bank was promoting Fido as a way of accessing their telephone banking system and I felt this would be a plus for me. Since they put one of those Timmy donut outlets on the parking lot near our bank, you can rarely find a parking space. I have actually considered changing banks simply because of the parking problems, so the bank by phone feature seemed like a good idea.

This promotion offered one model cell phone at zero cost and a smaller model for about $60.00. I responded by calling the Fido telephone number listed. The wait to get to a representative was over fifteen minutes that day so I decided to try again at another time. Three days later I was still trying to get through to Fido to sign up. Waits were at least fifteen minutes and even though they stated the wait was that length of time, my wait hit nearly a half hour one day and close to forty minutes on another. I tried again on a subsequent day and ended up waiting in the telephone que for well over a half hour again.

I finally reached a representative who advised me that the phone I was ordering would be shipped within a day and would reach me the day after shipping. The representative stated that the phone would be already activated with a number that we had selected when we ordered but would need a telephone call to permit final access to the system. It sounded good, especially the part about the phone being activated when it arrived. Activation can sometimes take quite a while and in some cases we have had to make a trip to a cellular service depot to have this done. I went ahead.

Sure enough the package arrived by courier at the promised time and I opened it up to have a look at the sleek new tiny phone. It seemed strange that the interior package was still in undisturbed factory wrappings. When I opened it up I soon noticed that nothing had been done to open the factory package or even place the battery in the phone let alone fire it up so that it could be activated.

Fido uses a special computer card (they call it a Smart Card) similar to those used in some satellite TV systems. The card stores information and software. Unfortunately it too was still in its original package so I knew nothing had been done in this area. In order to activate the phone with its telephone number the Smart Card has to be installed and this was not done.

I decided to install the battery so that the phone could be charged up and the phone tested. I knew that the number I selected was in service because I called it from my office and got the message that the customer was not available at that time. That meant the phone number was working but the phone was not turned on. I figured they had activated the phone because the number worked. I thought I had been very clever to call the number they assigned to me to see if they had done the activation work by that time. I decided to proceed to see where I was.

I tried to remove the back of the phone to insert the battery for charging but unfortunately I could not remove the back cover of the phone. I dug out the instruction book and even though I followed the instructions and checked and rechecked my procedure I just could not open the back.

Thinking that the model may have changed slightly since the instruction booklet was published I called the Canadian offices of the cellular phone manufacturer Nokia. Several people there tried to advise me on how to remove the back but even though I did it while they were talking to me on the phone I was not successful. Finally one of the representatives advised me that some of the units of that model were very difficult to open.

My wife Elizabeth can open anything. When I give up, she picks it up where I left off and usually succeeds. She couldn't get it open either and believe me she tried for a long time! In the next day or so we enlisted the help of nearly everyone who came in to the office to try and remove the back. "Read the instructions then remove the back!" - no one was successful.

Finally we headed off to a couple of local retail outlets that sold the same model phone and while we did not take ours along (because we had not purchased it from them) they showed us how to take the back off theirs very easily. They take the back off to show you the Smart card inside. It was obvious we had one that was a bit of a problem - perhaps that was why Fido's service department didn't set it up before shipping. Later we found out that Fido was reportedly overwhelmed with orders at the time we called and that was supposedly why the phones were not set up before they were shipped.

Calls to Fido again to try and see what to do involved considerably more time. I finally reached a representative after another twenty minute wait only to find out that the phone number we thought we had been assigned at sale had later been given to someone else! That was the answer as to why the phone was activated. While the representative tried his very best to get us another acceptable number, and made apologies for the things they had previously promised but didn't do, it appeared that I was getting into something that was just going to take too much time. I have an unwritten policy that if buying something is a problem there probably will be bigger problems later.

At this point I felt that perhaps this was 'a sign' and perhaps I should not continue with the service and telephone. After another fifteen minute period of time on hold I told the rep to just cancel everything. Unfortunately he said that was something that he could not do and I would have to call another number the following day to cancel.

Many cellular services have what some refer to as a "loyalty" department, a place you must go to discontinue service. They try their very best to keep you as a customer because they know if you leave them you are probably going right to their competitor for cellular service. I apparently hit that snag. More time, more wait the next day but I was finally successful in getting the program cancelled and made arrangements to have the phone returned under their 30 day return policy. They had a hard time understanding I could never get the phone to work but I finally got things in motion to return the phone.

In all I had spent over six hours on the phone ordering, trying to get the phone working and cancelling the program. I notified the bank the following day that the promotion they were a part of was not as acceptable as they thought. To put it bluntly - they were shocked!

The following day I received phone calls from several people at Fido. One was a response to a message I left at one Fido PR office to say that my story on this product would probably begin "My Fido was a bitch!" Frustration sometimes develops creativity but sometimes you get action. Linda Forde of Fido apologized for the problems and asked us to give them another chance. She arranged for me to use one of their phones for a test period of time.

I am pleased that Fido took the initiative because I probably would have rated Fido cellular below Cantel at that point, and readers may remember from our previous reports that I rated Cantel in the basement as far as service and business ethics were concerned. Personally I would have rather given a friend a communicable disease than give them a phone on the Cantel network!

Fido's representative convinced me I should consider a different phone than the tiny one I had ordered, primarily because the analogue module needed for calls outside the Fido coverage area was not available for the smaller digital phone I had ordered. A short time later the Fido representative delivered the phone to my office and provided some basic instructions.

One big plus for Fido is that small memory card in their phones somewhat like a miniaturized satellite TV program card. The card stores data like your own telephone number, your phone directory numbers and software to run programs like the banking feature. If you ever decide to change phones you simply pop open the back and remove the card from the old phone. You then slip the card into the new phone and you are back in business. There's no going back to the cellular shop while they deactivate one phone and then activate the new one.

As I mentioned, the Royal Bank software to access your bank accounts by phone is also recorded on this miniature card. Unfortunately the card they sent with the phone did not contain this software so we were not able to use it for the main purpose we originally decided to acquire the phone. A new card was to be shipped to us in a few days.

The new Smart Card arrived some time later and I went through an exercise of trying to get it to access the banking software. I was not successful! Unfortunately it too did not contain the software for the banking.

At the writing of this story several months later we still do not have the Royal Bank software on our phone despite many attempts by myself and the Fido representative to get it to us.

We proceeded with our testing for this story during the interim. Our opinion is that Fido is an excellent cellular service for customers in large cities where their coverage area extends to the area that the customer might like to travel. The digital quality of their service is second to none and their program packages are excellent.

Fido is one of a few cellular providers who charge you air time by the second rather than by the minute. If you make a call that is one minute and one second, you will be charged for two minutes by some cellular companies. We find that practice to be unacceptable considering that most customers do not realize that cellular time starts when you push the call button, not when the phone is answered. You are charged for the time it takes the cellular system to pick up the call, connect you to the number and the ringing time. A call that is not answered for several rings can easily put you into another minute just because of the billing protocol. Fido shines in this area because they charge you for what you use time by the second.

The basic program at the time we began gave 200 minutes any time of the day or night for $20 a month or 400 minutes for $40 a month. If you want more there are bigger packages. Unfortunately Fido is similar to the other Canadian cellular companies that charge an access fee each month. They all call it an access fee now rather than a "licensing fee", probably because consumers found out that the federal body that controls cellular service discontinued charging a license fee to the individual users years ago. Most cellular companies continued to charge the fee even though it was no longer charged to them. This is the one major bone of contention I have with all cellular companies in Canada.

To be practical, one should just add the monthly access fee to the package they are looking at and use the total as the actual monthly fee for comparison. Some company's access fees are higher while some per minute fees are higher. Lumping the two charges together gives you a more accurate reflection of the monthly cost.

Free phones are a way of life with cellular services now - a far cry from the $4,200 I paid for my first cellular phone when the service began in Canada years ago.

Fido offers free phones with many of its packages and as we have said before digital is the way to go for quality but digital service is not everywhere. For this reason cellular customers should make sure that they can access both digital and analogue cellular towers to get their calls out. Some cellular companies have towers for both modes of communications but Fido is exclusively digital. Years from now the analogue cellular service will have probably gone the way of the dodo bird but you need both analogue and digital at this time.

Many phones are programmed to look for digital service first but then when digital is not found can they switch to analogue and look for an analogue cell to access. Fido is strictly a digital service so to get analogue service on their phones you must use an optional analogue module. One thing we had a difficult time understanding was why there was a separate charge of 20 cents per minute when used in the analogue mode. My question to them was "If I am buying 400 minutes per month why would you charge me extra for analogue when I have perhaps half my time still unused?" The answer I finally determined was that in analogue mode your calls are picked up by the Bell Cellular network and they charge the time back to Fido - no doubt by the minute rather than by the second. If you use analogue service the cellular carrier that takes your call is going to bill it back to Fido and then they are going to bill you for it too.

For some reason most cellular services do not have enough staff on their telephone lines. I suppose there are thousands of calls a day to each of them for everything from initial sign ups to resolution of billing problems. The reality of it is if you call any of them you are probably going to have a wait.

Fido's representative apologized for my initial six hours on the phone to arrange and then cancel service. It was reportedly a result of hitting them at a time when they were overwhelmed with calls and were adding to their telephone staff. Training apparently takes a few weeks and in order to add more operators they had to put them through the courses. I apparently called in the midst of this problem.

Fido supplied us with a small Nokia 5190 digital phone for our test. We also have the optional analogue module that I can slip on when I know I am out of the digital area.

The digital quality is excellent, the best we have ever had for clarity. I suspect that they need more cells in our area because there are many shopping malls and large stores that I try to call from and have a "no service" screen. If I leave the building I am back in service so that indicates just a weak signal. Certainly we know that building cells for this type of service is costly and it takes a while for them to solve this problem.

Our package is $40 for 400 minutes a month and we added a message service. If you call me and I don't answer you can leave a message in my mailbox. Later when I turn my phone on I will be notified that I have messages and I can call you back. For a couple of extra dollars a month this is a good feature. We also took call display - $3.00 a month feature. The banking feature is 20 cents per time but we may never have to pay this because they just can't get it working on our package.

The one feature that I really like is the long life Ni-Mi battery. Nickel hydride batteries are unlike nickel cad batteries that had to be fully discharged each use or they developed a "memory" that would limit their life to that of what you normally used them until you recharged them. NiMi batteries have long operating times, can be recharged at any time without developing a "memory" and are recharged in a relatively short time.

The battery on our test unit lasts for days at a time. I have even deliberately left it on overnight for several days. Of course "talk time" is what uses the most energy with a cell phone and this will have an effect on the life. Car charge cords bring batteries like this up to full charge much faster than on AC chargers used inside. A couple of hours brings the battery right back to full charge when I pop it in the power outlet in my truck.

While Fido growled at us at first, the tail began to wag a little later and I must say that within its area (big city digital coverage area) Fido is an excellent alternative. I strongly recommend purchase of a cell phone that has the analogue module if you opt for Fido because this would give you coverage outside the big city areas. I expect that Fido will also be adding more Canadian cities and routes to their coverage area in the near future.

I have tried Fido in the United States and the host cellular service name pops up on the screen automatically once you enter their coverage area. You do not have to notify Fido that you are leaving the country or notify the cellular company that you are in their area. Fido has a very reasonable roaming rate while in the U.S.A. You can call any time of the day anywhere in the U.S. or Canada for just 30 cents (US$) per minute. Compared to the cost of other cellular services when you are in the U.S. this is very competitive!

Another of Fido's services is "i.Fido" - an information service directly from the internet. You can have radio or newspaper information sent directly to your handset display. i.Fido can remind you of important meetings or get you weather, stock quotes and information on restaurants, movies and hotels. You don't need to subscribe to anything because i.Fido service access is included in your service. You get up to 20 messages a month at no additional charge and beyond that it is only 10 cents a message. We have not tested this feature at press time. Fido is a relatively young player in the Canadian cellular market and as such is probably experiencing some "growing pains". I think we can honestly consider our initial problems with them a result of their expansion. They did try and correct the problems, something at least one other cellular provider never bothered to do. I still try to steer people away from that service.

A recent test showed that we reached a Fido representative on the telephone in less than five minutes - that too is more acceptable. For more information on Fido you can contact them at 1-888 481-FIDO (3436) or on the internet at FIDO

Readers are reminded that cellular packages change very often and current packages offered might differ to those discussed in this story.

Fido Shines in USA test
(July 2002)

One of the most important questions many RVers ask when choosing a cellular phone is how well it will work when they travel into the United States.

In the past, some cellular companies required you to call a special number when you were leaving Canada to have the system "follow you" as you ventured into the U.S.A.

Some Canadian cellular users also found that when they went to use their phones in the U.S.A. they were switched to an operator or automated system that required them to supply a current credit card to charge access fees and calls to when placed in that specific area. Many U.S. cellular services charged a per day access fee that was not appropriate to a Canadian RVer just travelling through that particular State on their way to the sunny south or some other U.S. destination.

One could easily pass through several of these service areas while on a day's drive, racking up a lot in daily access fees.

At best it was not acceptable and became a real problem for many RV cellular phone users.

We have been testing the Fido system for the past several months and during that time we had to make an sudden trip into the Ohio/Indiana/Kentucky border area for a relative's funeral.

Fido advertises that they can find your cell phone if you are in any of the digital cellular service areas of associated U.S. telephone companies that provide digital cellular service where you might travel.

On many occasions during our trip our phone rang with a call from our home city. We also have Fido's message service, so calls placed to us at a time when we either had the phone turned off or were outside an associate company's service area, went to our message service.

Once we drove into an area served by a U.S. associate company digital cellular service, our phone beeped indicating that we had messages. Fido found us.

A simple call then to our message service at Fido headquarters in Canada let us access those messages and return the calls.

Many times calls from Canada came right through with family and business associates having no prior knowledge as to where we were.

Our destination city of Evansville, Indiana, unfortunately was not one of those cities that Fido had a digital service relationship in place, but as soon as we drove out of that area we would get messages and calls.

It appears that for an RVer travelling to a U.S. destination, Fido would work well. If there was no reciprocal service in the spot where they were at the time of the call, their phone message service would pick it up when they did drive into an associated digital service area. Communications at all times we used it were extremely good quality.

Fido's charges for calls in the U.S.A. to anywhere in the U.S.A. or Canada are 30 cents (US$) per minute with no additional daily service fee.

We were extremely pleased with the Fido system when we made this trip and found Fido's U.S. service to be the best that we have used to date.

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