Rogers, Fido to charge $75 fee to customers still using 2G network

Rogers is sending some clients an electronic mail about its 2G community retirement and threatening charges for individuals who don’t improve their gadgets earlier than the tip of June.

In line with a Fido support page in regards to the shutdown, clients might even see a $75 administrative cost after June 30, whereas some clients might have already seen a $3 month-to-month “Legacy Community Utilization Payment.” Nevertheless, that payment will go away after June 30.

If that sounds acquainted, it’s as a result of Rogers used the same playbook throughout final 12 months’s 3G community shutdown. In June 2025, Rogers added a one-time $75 fee for customers who were still using the 3G network by the tip of the month, and earlier than that Rogers began charging customers a $3/mo ‘Legacy Network Usage’ fee for persevering with to make use of the 3G community.

This time round, a number of Fido clients took to Reddit to share info they’d acquired associated to the upcoming 2G shutdown and the brand new payment. One buyer shared a bit of the e-mail, which reads:

“If you don’t take the steps required to transition to our up to date community earlier than J‍une ‍30, ‍2‍026, a $75 2G Administrative Cost shall be utilized to your account to cowl prices related to our transition efforts. This cost will solely be utilized as soon as even if in case you have a number of traces on the identical account on the 2G community. You possibly can keep away from this cost by transitioning to our upgraded community.”

Nevertheless, the modifications aren’t restricted to Fido clients, as each Rogers and the flanker brand have devoted help pages associated to the 2G shutdown. The help pages be aware that Rogers will retire the 2G community on November 30, 2027. Furthermore, the help pages be aware that Rogers is providing $0 gadgets to assist clients transition, and that clients gained’t want to alter plans “in virtually all instances.”

The core difficulty is similar to what occurred with the 3G shutdown final 12 months, which left many purchasers in a lurch. Briefly, some telephones fall again to older wi-fi community bands like 2G or 3G when making telephone calls. Usually, this impacts older telephones that may not help voice over LTE (VoLTE), which is required to make calls over 4G.

Nevertheless, there are tons of consumers who’ve gadgets that help VoLTE however can’t use it in Canada for numerous causes. For instance, some gadgets won’t have the mandatory service certification to make use of VoLTE, whereas others may lack sure software program or firmware updates wanted to allow the performance. (OnePlus telephones, for instance, had several issues during the 3G shutdown due to this.)

What to do when you obtain a 2G shutdown electronic mail

Anybody who receives an electronic mail from Rogers or Fido associated to the 2G shutdown ought to take a while to examine whether or not their telephone is appropriate earlier than speeding out to purchase a brand new system. Rogers offers an online compatibility checker to see if a telephone is appropriate. Additional, clients can dial #348378 to see if their telephone is putting calls over VoLTE.

In some instances, clients will be capable of tweak the settings on their telephone to allow VoLTE. Whereas it gained’t work for everybody, impacted clients ought to examine their telephones’ service settings to see if VoLTE may be enabled. (For Android customers, examine in Settings > Community and Web. For iPhone, examine Settings > Mobile.)

Clients unable to allow VoLTE might must improve their system. You additionally may be capable of change to a different supplier, nevertheless it’s value noting that may solely purchase you slightly time as other Canadian carriers are moving toward their own network shutdowns. Lastly, some folks say they’d success with complaints to the Commission for Complaints for Telecom-television Services (CCTS) in regards to the charges, however your mileage might fluctuate with that.