Spotty service, U.S. roaming charges leave Somerset woman calling for answers Weak signal in community underscores need for better coverage, she says By: Nicole Buffie Posted: 5:37 PM CDT Wednesday, Aug. 12, 2026

A southwestern Manitoba woman is voicing her concerns about cell service in the area after she was billed more than $100 in U.S. roaming charges despite never leaving her community.

Teresa Acheson received a notification on her phone Monday at about 7:30 a.m. saying she had entered the United States and would be charged $13 per day for unlimited calls and text messages.

The only problem is that she was not in the U.S. She was lying in bed at her home near Somerset, some 50 kilometres away from the U.S. border.

“People have said to watch if you’re driving close to the border because you’ll get dinged, but I was sitting at home,” she said Wednesday.

Knowing this was a common occurrence in her area, she checked her Bell MTS account to see if she had been charged recently. She found 10 different billings for international roaming on her account since July 1 totalling more than $100.

She said because of her weak signal, she hadn’t received any notifications to her phone informing her she had connected to a U.S. tower.

“You have to try to explain that you haven’t travelled to the U.S. and this is a further result of service gaps in our area.”

She complained to the telecom company, and was told its system showed the charges were valid. A Bell MTS employee suggested she switch off roaming capabilities on her cellphone, but that came as little comfort to her given the connectivity issues in the region.

“It would further restrict my ability to connect to any cell tower, but that’s the only option they gave me,” she said. “It seems awkward that you have to try to explain that you haven’t travelled to the U.S. and this is a further result of service gaps in our area.”

Acheson moved back to her home community in January to care for her elderly parents after living in Yukon for 25 years. She says she had better service in remote areas of the northern territory than she does now in Somerset.

A Free Press reporter was unable to reach Acheson for an interview by phone Wednesday and had to connect with her via a Wi-Fi call on a social media app, which she says underscores the issues in the area.

Bell MTS spokesperson Elise von Scheel said customers travelling near the Canada-U.S. border may pick up cell signals from the U.S., based on the proximity of nearby cell towers. Signal pickups are related to proximity to towers and tower ranges, as well as geographic terrain, von Scheel said in an email.

Bell has systems in place to monitor signal registrations near the border and actively tries to keep customers connected to Bell’s network as long as there is sufficient signal, but the land border is substantial with many customers living close to cell towers on both sides, von Scheel said.

“Sporadic instances of accidental roaming can occur given the vastness of the land border, but this is not a common occurrence.”

“U.S. residents will also occasionally experience the same situation with Canadian towers and within Canada, this is not something unique to Bell or Manitoba,” von Scheel said.

“Sporadic instances of accidental roaming can occur given the vastness of the land border, but this is not a common occurrence and Bell takes proactive steps to keep customers tethered to the network when possible and educates customers on manual steps they can take to restrict data roaming.”

Customers can manually lock their device to the Bell network or manually disable roaming. If roaming charges are incurred that customers believe are incorrect, the charge can be disputed within 90 days of the invoice date.

Von Scheel did not answer questions about issues with accidental roaming charges in the Somerset area, or whether the company is looking at improving connectivity in the region.

Acheson plans to escalate her complaint with Bell and submit a complaint to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission and the Commission for Complaints for Telecom-television Services, but she says the problem must also be dealt with on a larger scale.

Acheson, who works as the chief financial officer for the Rural Municipality of Lorne, says the issue comes up often around the council table. Council has written to the MP and Acheson has been advocating for improvements since moving to the community.

CRTC spokesperson Mirabella Salem said Wednesday the public tribunal is aware that roaming charges can be a concern for Canadians, particularly in some border communities, and suggested customers turn off their roaming capabilities or submit a complaint when accidental charges are incurred.

The CRTC does not keep statistics on the number of complaints it receives about false roaming charges, Salem said.

In April, the CRTC announced new measures to help residents stay informed about charges to their cellphone bills, including ensuring customers receive notifications when their data usage reaches $50 when roaming internationally.

Acheson said she wants Bell MTS to look after its customers and for her to receive adequate service for the plan she pays a monthly fee for.

“The assumption is that you have a connection… whether that’s marking yourself safe in an emergency, whether it’s government services, hospital services, or the businesses that you’re trying to interact with, and this lack of connectivity or these extra charges then for being connected to the U.S. really puts rural areas and this area of Somerset at a disadvantage,” she said.

In 2024, the federal government announced it was spending $7.5 million to bring mobile connectivity to eight northern Manitoba First Nations, but similar commitments for areas with spotty or no service in southern Manitoba have yet to be made.

nicole.buffie@freepress.mb.ca