CRTC to open inquiry on cellphone companies and their contracts

[FerrariEnzo]

"Canadians who have felt the sting of small print in their cellphone contracts are going to get some relief.

The federal telecommunications regulator announced on Thursday plans to end complicated contract language used by the country’s wireless carriers. It is also considering whether to create rules on cancellation fees, a flashpoint with Canadians who are generally locked into three-year agreements that limit their ability to switch carriers."

Source


I guess we can start to see more of the TAB system in place if this come through..

[Soundy]

The people who whine about being locked into contracts piss me off. THAT'S WHAT YOU SIGNED UP FOR, IDIOT. THAT'S WHY IT'S CALLED A CONTRACT. Nobody held a gun to your head - they offered you a screamin' deal to get a $600 phone for free if you lock in for three years. Well fucker, you signed the deal, you got the phone... they held up their end of the bargain, now it's time for you to hold your end up, not go whining to the government about how unfair it is. You don't like the deal, DON'T SIGN UP.

[!Yaminashi]

Originally Posted by Soundy

The people who whine about being locked into contracts piss me off. THAT'S WHAT YOU SIGNED UP FOR, IDIOT. THAT'S WHY IT'S CALLED A CONTRACT. Nobody held a gun to your head - they offered you a screamin' deal to get a $600 phone for free if you lock in for three years. Well fucker, you signed the deal, you got the phone... they held up their end of the bargain, now it's time for you to hold your end up, not go whining to the government about how unfair it is. You don't like the deal, DON'T SIGN UP.

For me it's more of whether or not they actually honor the terms of that contract. It seems Rogers likes to conveniently forget the terms that were agreed upon and create their own, and it usually results in a shittier plan for more. I understand people whining about that.
Posted via RS Mobile

[jackmeister]

Originally Posted by !Yaminashi

For me it's more of whether or not they actually honor the terms of that contract. It seems Rogers likes to conveniently forget the terms that were agreed upon and create their own, and it usually results in a shittier plan for more. I understand people whining about that.
Posted via RS Mobile

IIRC you've signed the contract to commit yourself to doing business with them (in exchange for a new phone or a large subsidy) as opposed committing to a specific plan

[snails]

one of the reasons i cant handle people bitching about being stuck or signing contracts is that you are going to need a phone anyways, I have been with rogers for about 5 years, sure i wish it was cheaper, but all cell service is expensive, sure i wish i could just change sometimes, but then i have to face problems with Telus, Fido, and the other service providers, i need a phone for the next 3 years so i don't mind signing again and dont mind getting a free iPhone either!

and if you are having serious enough problems with a provider, just keep speaking to someone higher than the last person you talked to, become more assertive each time and eventually you will get what you want "in most cases" ive talked 800$ phone bills down to 100$ in the past, and gotten many free benefits added to my plan aswell

[Spoon]

Originally Posted by FerrariEnzo

I guess we can start to see more of the TAB system in place if this come through..

If it's the standard -$50/year, you're going to hear a lot more whining from consumers who want high end phones they can't afford unless it's heavily subsidized by 3 year plans.

[Mr.HappySilp]

Originally Posted by snails

one of the reasons i cant handle people bitching about being stuck or signing contracts is that you are going to need a phone anyways, I have been with rogers for about 5 years, sure i wish it was cheaper, but all cell service is expensive, sure i wish i could just change sometimes, but then i have to face problems with Telus, Fido, and the other service providers, i need a phone for the next 3 years so i don't mind signing again and dont mind getting a free iPhone either!

and if you are having serious enough problems with a provider, just keep speaking to someone higher than the last person you talked to, become more assertive each time and eventually you will get what you want "in most cases" ive talked 800$ phone bills down to 100$ in the past, and gotten many free benefits added to my plan aswell

Well I got Rgoers before.... but they keep jacking up the price...... even after I agure with them my contract did not mention this as I never call to change my package. Their answer is pretty much live it with pay to cancel the contract.

[Psykopathik]

they should be throwing shit at us to get our business, not us begging for promos/credits.

no contracts for me.

[terkan]

well they subsidized you already for the phone and you agreed to term and accepted to their offer... so ya.. why complain afterward? i mean they even allow you to change your plan at anytime now just not below a certain price point if you are on the high end smartphones so i don't know what more ppl can complain about. a lot of ppl impulse buy/sign up for a contract coz they want the latest and greatest... if you don't want a contract then buy a phone outright and stop complaining. if you want to be subsidized then make sure you know what you are getting yourself into before signing and stop complaining about it afterward zzz

[wasabisashimi]

Originally Posted by Mr.HappySilp

Well I got Rgoers before.... but they keep jacking up the price...... even after I agure with them my contract did not mention this as I never call to change my package. Their answer is pretty much live it with pay to cancel the contract.

if you agreed on a 3 year plan for certain amount of monthly. Is it not illegal to alter the plan without your agreement down the road?..

I think if Rogers do this to customers all the time, someone should do some investigation or class action law suit for this type of shady business practice.


I am always afraid, if my 40$ plan with lots of credit gonna become 80$ plan next month because you mention they can do this type of shit.

[Soundy]

Originally Posted by wasabisashimi

if you agreed on a 3 year plan for certain amount of monthly. Is it not illegal to alter the plan without your agreement down the road?..

Not necessarily, because you're not agreeing to the PLAN for three years, you're just agreeing to be under their thumb for that period... usually with a minimum plan. Telus, for example, requires something like a minimum $45 voice/data plan for subsidized smartphones. It could be MORE than that, but not less... so you can't get an iPhone 5 free with a $15/month voice-only plan, for example.

I think if Rogers do this to customers all the time, someone should do some investigation or class action law suit for this type of shady business practice.

If you read the fine print, there's probably a clause there that says they're allowed to change your air/data plan without cause or notice. Most companies WON'T (Telus has never forced a plan change on us in 16+ years), because it IS a cheezy thing to do to your customers, but the contract probably allows them to.

I am always afraid, if my 40$ plan with lots of credit gonna become 80$ plan next month because you mention they can do this type of shit.

Unfortunately (or not), if you agree to something without reading or understanding the fine print, then legally, it's your own damn fault if you get screwed by that fine print. "How was I supposed to know" won't hold up in any dispute, because the answer is simply, "read the contract, and if you don't understand it, ask someone who does to read it for you."

[terkan]

Originally Posted by wasabisashimi

I am always afraid, if my 40$ plan with lots of credit gonna become 80$ plan next month because you mention they can do this type of shit.

whenever they offer you credit.. they don't tell you how long the credit is for.. it's not necessary for the full 3yrs duration of your contract.. and when you renew your contract... it doesn't renew your credits.. you are just renewing your price plan before the credits.. i mean they don't change the plan on you once you have it.. the prices goes up because the credit you had on the account either expired or never renewed.

[wasabisashimi]

Can retention send u renewed contract to read and will it show all the credits? To me every renewal is by verbal phone call agreement. I have never seen a paper contract

[Graeme S]

This is one of those places where legal semantics come into play. A contract is a solid and binding document which states out the benefits each party is providing to the other.

What you sign with one of the companies is not a contract for services. It is, in fact, a service agreement. "We, in exchange for getting money, agree to provide you the service of having your cellphone. But we can change the agreement unilaterally and without notice because it's a service agreement and not a contract."

Things have been easier and better (especially for Rogers customers who have suffered from being jerked around) since Manitoba and Quebec both passed consumer protection bills. Things that I liked from both bills (but are not necessarily nation-wide policies at all companies) include
- Cancellation fee cannot be greater than phone subsidy
- Pricing and billing arrangements cannot be changed even after the duration of the current term without mutual consent
- All costs and fees must be stated up front (including the "unlimited" limits--typically RoBelLus hides the fact that "unlimited" texts is actually somewhere between 3000-5000 and will charge after)


And so on and so forth. I like those things, especially since I experienced getting jerked around by Rogers before. Signed up my then-girlfriend for a back to school plan of $50ish that included data. Fast forward to November and the bill jumps to $80. Why? She bought the phone outright and did month-to-month billing. Since she didn't sign a contract "the plan she signed up for no longer exists, and I'm sorry but there's nothign I can do to change that" from four customer service reps. Since she'd sunk the money into the phone...nothing to be done.

There are some other things I'd like to see as well: Retentions consistency. Or at least some fucking transparency. Wasabi, wasn't it you who had to call in to rogers like 5 times before they'd offer you something that'd keep you from switching to Wind? Or was that someone else. Either way, some people get lucky and some people get fucked. I was a Rogers customer of ten years paying more than $60 a month, and I asked to get brought down to around $50. No added features or extra anything, just a discount. They said "too bad, our plans are on our website" three times, and I said fuckit, porting to wind.

Something else that would be nifty/nice is the method of charging with subsidies like they do in Korea.
Let's say you buy a phone on contract. Your phone bill is $25 (I know, fantasy land) and your term is two years. Your phone costs $600, but you only pay $120 up front. The company subsidizes your phone for $240 and finances the other $240 over those two years. So your total bill is $35 for two years, and then $25 after that. Separating the subsidy and creating a financing section allows for the company to eat less of the subsidy while making more hardware sales and giving benefits to customers who don't upgrade as frequently. Oh, and if you cancel your phone contract early, you have to pay back the subsidy and also the unfinanced part of the phone. So if you cancel after one year you owe $360 (subsidy of 240+ 120 unfinanced).

Honestly, that kind of strategy seems win/win/win for me....but I guess it would take a huge shift in the business model, and companies like Rogers that have to keep high earnings in order to maintain their dividends are quite resistant to change.

[Hehe]

I think what they need is one thing: honesty.

Stop saying that a phone is only x dollar with 3 years contract. Just say that a phone is xxx dollars and you are financing at a particular rate, at a particular monthly payment and keep the subsidy separated from cell plan. I want my bill to show xx dollar on service AND then xx dollar for phone financing. And I get to pay it off whenever I want. More like financing for a car, but for cellphone.

Another thing with contracts is that provider MUST unlock any phone that comes off the term for free. Because the subsidy is over once the term is satisfied. The phone should now becomes property of the respective owner and he/she should be able to use the phone as he/she wishes. By locking phones (whether they have cheap unlock or not) beyond their original term, they essentially force users to stick with the same provider or go to other provider with yet another contract.

Better yet, make the financing on the account rather than phone (so, it's a bit different than car financing where the financing company retains the property right until terms satisfied) and stop this phone locking non-sense. So people can still sell the phones they got with their hardware upgrade/contract renewal... etc, but doesn't take away their ability to exchange phone privately.

This way, we can simply sell 100% unlocked phones in Canada. And people are free to choose what term they want to choose, what payment options they want... etc.

[TypeRNammer]

Fido's contract stacking policy is brutal

[shenmecar]

Originally Posted by wasabisashimi

Can retention send u renewed contract to read and will it show all the credits? To me every renewal is by verbal phone call agreement. I have never seen a paper contract

actually they do, if you are with Rogers and you renew your contract through retentions and get credits, check the last few pages of your next bill. It should say when your contract and credits expire.

Originally Posted by Graeme S

- All costs and fees must be stated up front (including the "unlimited" limits--typically RoBelLus hides the fact that "unlimited" texts is actually somewhere between 3000-5000 and will charge after)

Telus' unlimited text is truly unlimited. My brother made a personal record of 12xxx texts (in and out) without being charged. I'm on Rogers and generally use around 2000-3000 texts a month without ever being charged a text overage on my unlimited text plan. So I think when Robelus says its unlimited text, it should be okay.

[shenmecar]

double post

[noTirl]

i think unlimited text actually means unlimited. A friend of mines went over 15000 text outgoing text once in the summer...dat der crackberry addict