Effective August 5, 2009, Rogers Wireless will introduce new Student Plans. Both new and existing customers may opt for these plans after August 5, 2009 and up to November 2, 2009.

Rogers Student Plans (2009)

BC/Alberta/Quebec/Ontario Regions

$35 Student Plan

• Minutes: 200 Daytime Minutes + 50 Bonus Minutes
• Evenings & Weekends: Unlimited @ 6PM
• Promo: Choose 1 of: Unlimited Messages or My5 Local Talk & Text or Double your Daytime Minutes
• Term: 3-Years
• Note: Customer must have a valid student ID from a recognized High School or Post-Secondary Institution

The $35 Student Plan is identical to the normal Rogers $35 Mega Value Plan except that this one includes 6PM evenings for free.

HTC Dream/Magic Price

You will have to have an attached Data Plan ($40 Smartphone Data Value Pack, $30 6GB Data Plan, $25 500MB Data Plan, etc), and then the HTC Dream/Magic from Rogers will cost you $99 under this plan.

$50 Student Plan

• Minutes: 200 Daytime Minutes
• Evenings & Weekends: Unlimited @ 6PM
• Data: 500MB
• Promo: My5 Canada-wide
• Optional: Double your Data to 1GB for $5/month more
• Term: 3-Years
• Note: Customer must have a valid student ID from a recognized High School or Post-Secondary Institution

The $50 Student Plan is similar to the normal Rogers $45 Mega Value Voice & Data Plan except that this one includes 6PM evenings for free, Canada-wide My5 instead of Local, 50 more daytime minutes, is $5 more but no additional options such as Double your Daytime Minutes or Unlimited Messages.

HTC Dream/Magic Price

The HTC Dream/Magic from Rogers will cost you $99 under this plan.

Rogers Student Plans 2008 Comparison

As a comparison, here are the student plans from last year 2008 for BC/AB/ON/QC:

$25 Student Plan (2008)

• Minutes: 100 Daytime Minutes
• Incoming Minutes: 500 Incoming Minutes
• Evenings & Weekends: 1000 minutes @ 6PM
• Extra Feature: My10 Local
• Term: 3-Years

$45 Student Plan (2008)

• Minutes: 450 Daytime Minutes
• Incoming Minutes: Unlimited Incoming Minutes
• Evenings & Weekends: Unlimited @ 6PM
• Extra Feature: My10 Canada-wide
• Term: 3-Years

Both of the student plans from 2008 are infinitely better than the new ones in 2009 (from the BC/AB/ON/QC regions), especially with the inclusion of My10 and the incoming minutes. Ultimately, it will be you that decides if these are worth it or not.

My10 and the free 6PM evenings overlay add-on

6PM Evenings Add-On

On a side note, a mostly unannounced feature that comes with the release of Rogers student plans is the separate free 6PM evenings overlay add-on that can be added to any existing plan that does not already have 6PM or earlier evenings.

This is a great feature add-on because it saves you $7 per month, but you do need to qualify as a student for the overlay by providing your school name (recognized High School or Post-Secondary Institution) and student ID number. However, it seems that Rogers has not released anything yet regarding this overlay add-on.

To qualify for the free 6PM overlay add-on, simply contact Rogers at 1-888-ROGERS1 and provide a student ID number and corresponding recognized High School/Post-Secondary Institution. As an existing customer, you must have an “in-market” plan which means that your plan has to be current. Usually this means within the last 12 months, but call Rogers to double check your plan status when you intend to add the 6PM.

As a new Rogers customer, you are covered because your plan is definitely new. When getting new Rogers service, simply request the 6PM overlay from your Rogers representative if you are signing up for a plan that is not one of the two Student Plans.

My10 Feature

It is also worth noting that Rogers did not release the My10 feature (started at My5) last year in 2008 until TELUS Mobility released their My10 feature, as Rogers tends to imitate instead of innovate when it comes to wireless plans.

So we may still see the My10 feature show up later in August this year, I hope!