>BCE Inc., Rogers Communications Inc. and Telus Corp. have until Nov. 4 to inform the CRTC of “concrete steps” they are taking to respond to concerns about rising cellphone fees that Canadians face when travelling abroad.
>
>The CRTC said Monday that if it finds the companies are not making “sufficient progress” on the matter, it will launch a formal public proceeding.
>
>”Canadians need to stay connected when they travel, but often come home to high cellphone bills,” said CRTC chairperson Vicky Eatrides in a press release.
>
>”The CRTC is taking action to help reduce roaming fees and is ready to launch a formal public proceeding if Canadians’ concerns are not addressed.”
>
>…
>
>The CRTC said its review — which relied on confidential information from Canadian cellphone companies, along with studies and public information on roaming — found Canadian travellers often face “inflexible” roaming rates regardless of how much they use their cellphone abroad.
>
>The commission said Canadians should have the flexibility to choose an affordable plan that best meets their needs.
>
>The regulator also said carriers must address domestic wholesale roaming rates that are paid by companies to one another when customers travel outside of a provider’s coverage area.
>
>It said agreements setting the wholesale roaming rates between cellphone service providers are “several years old” and current rates do not reflect today’s market.
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>Providers must set new rates through “timely negotiations” with each other, the regulator said.
>
>If providers cannot come to an agreement, the CRTC said it will set the rates through an arbitration process.
It’s good that the CRTC is pushing on the big telcos to take some concrete steps. It will be interesting to see how they respond. Hopefully though there might be some improvements in our service from this.
Windatar on
“Pwease lower the rates.”
What a joke, what they should say is.
“Lower the god damn rates or we’re letting in competition from the USA. Capitulate or suffer.”
Educational-Bid-3533 on
If anyone has a gif of Mr. Burns having a laughing fit, now is the time to deploy it.
Titsfortuesday on
How about allowing VoLTE on non-carrier phones instead of relying on whitelisting them? What’s the point of “BYOP” plans if you can’t use the network properly? Same chipsets, same bands, same modem etc. Completely compatible phones but they’re just being greedy like always. They keep pushing the date for 3G shutdown but when they do, a *lot* of customers are going to get screwed over.
Koodo is actually charging you extra for using 3G because you’re using an “incompatible” phone when they’re the ones responsible for whitelisting it. They’re actively blocking you so they can charge you extra.
Krazee9 on
Roam-like-home used to be $5/day in the US to a max of, like, $70 and $12/day internationally to a max of, like, $120. Now it’s $14/day to the US and $16/day international, and the max cap is nearly $300 for US roaming and I think over that for international. That’s insane.
tricky4444 on
I still remember the good old days when someone went to Europe and returned to a $3,000 cell phone bill /s
Nonamanadus on
Maybe deregulation?
forestapee on
I just paid $20 cad for 500mb data from Telus. Fuck em all
FromundaCheeseLigma on
Maybe the CRTC who is supposed to work for the people yet works for the telecoms should push back a little?
Biggest joke in Canadian business history – create an organization that regulates telecom where former Canadian telecom oligarchy retires directly into
9 Comments
Two excerpts below:
>BCE Inc., Rogers Communications Inc. and Telus Corp. have until Nov. 4 to inform the CRTC of “concrete steps” they are taking to respond to concerns about rising cellphone fees that Canadians face when travelling abroad.
>
>The CRTC said Monday that if it finds the companies are not making “sufficient progress” on the matter, it will launch a formal public proceeding.
>
>”Canadians need to stay connected when they travel, but often come home to high cellphone bills,” said CRTC chairperson Vicky Eatrides in a press release.
>
>”The CRTC is taking action to help reduce roaming fees and is ready to launch a formal public proceeding if Canadians’ concerns are not addressed.”
>
>…
>
>The CRTC said its review — which relied on confidential information from Canadian cellphone companies, along with studies and public information on roaming — found Canadian travellers often face “inflexible” roaming rates regardless of how much they use their cellphone abroad.
>
>The commission said Canadians should have the flexibility to choose an affordable plan that best meets their needs.
>
>The regulator also said carriers must address domestic wholesale roaming rates that are paid by companies to one another when customers travel outside of a provider’s coverage area.
>
>It said agreements setting the wholesale roaming rates between cellphone service providers are “several years old” and current rates do not reflect today’s market.
>
>Providers must set new rates through “timely negotiations” with each other, the regulator said.
>
>If providers cannot come to an agreement, the CRTC said it will set the rates through an arbitration process.
It’s good that the CRTC is pushing on the big telcos to take some concrete steps. It will be interesting to see how they respond. Hopefully though there might be some improvements in our service from this.
“Pwease lower the rates.”
What a joke, what they should say is.
“Lower the god damn rates or we’re letting in competition from the USA. Capitulate or suffer.”
If anyone has a gif of Mr. Burns having a laughing fit, now is the time to deploy it.
How about allowing VoLTE on non-carrier phones instead of relying on whitelisting them? What’s the point of “BYOP” plans if you can’t use the network properly? Same chipsets, same bands, same modem etc. Completely compatible phones but they’re just being greedy like always. They keep pushing the date for 3G shutdown but when they do, a *lot* of customers are going to get screwed over.
Koodo is actually charging you extra for using 3G because you’re using an “incompatible” phone when they’re the ones responsible for whitelisting it. They’re actively blocking you so they can charge you extra.
Roam-like-home used to be $5/day in the US to a max of, like, $70 and $12/day internationally to a max of, like, $120. Now it’s $14/day to the US and $16/day international, and the max cap is nearly $300 for US roaming and I think over that for international. That’s insane.
I still remember the good old days when someone went to Europe and returned to a $3,000 cell phone bill /s
Maybe deregulation?
I just paid $20 cad for 500mb data from Telus. Fuck em all
Maybe the CRTC who is supposed to work for the people yet works for the telecoms should push back a little?
Biggest joke in Canadian business history – create an organization that regulates telecom where former Canadian telecom oligarchy retires directly into