Rebate on the way for phone customers - Upto $ 90 in ON,BC,QC,AB & MB

[tjthemanto]

Canadians who live in urban centres can expect rebates of up to $90 from their phone company — although it could take six months.


The rebates follow a lengthy and hotly contested debate over how to distribute more than $300 million from a special fund orchestrated by Canada’s telecommunications regulator.



On Tuesday the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) directed Bell Canada, Bell Aliant, Telus and MTS Allstream to rebate $310.8 million of a $770 million set aside in deferral funds for their urban home telephone customers.


That rebate will range from $25 to $90 per subscriber and will be available to customers in Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba, Alberta and British Columbia sometime in the next six months.



Exactly how customers will get the cash back wasn’t immediately known. One option laid out by the CRTC would allow the phone companies to offer a special service promotion, as long as it is worth more than the rebate. If a customer decides to walk away from one of the big companies within the next six months the rebate will be applied to their final bill.


In a statement CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein described the decision as a “positive solution for Canadian consumers.”



Not all the money will end up taking a chunk out of Canadian phone bills. The CRTC has also approved using about $422 million of money in the funds to deploy broadband Internet service to 287 rural and remote communities by 2014.


The service is expected to be “comparable to urban areas and fast enough to link residents to Telehealth services and bring about business and educational opportunities,” the CRTC said.


Bell’s Mirko Bibic, senior vice-president of regulatory and government affairs, expressed frustration at the decision. Bell had proposed outfitting about 112 rural and remote communities with wireless-based networks instead of hard-line service which is considerably slower, said Bibic. That proposal was rejected on Tuesday, meaning those customers are being denied access to a lot of the cutting edge technology available in cities, he said.



Bibic called that decision one of several “backward looking” moves by the regulator in recent days, referring to the CRTC’s decision on Monday that phone companies must offer smaller Internet service providers access to their highest broadband speeds. If anything that will decrease the incentive for the company to invest in improving services in those areas, he said.


Bell has not decided exactly how they will offer the credit to their customers, he said.
The deferral account funds were created in 2002 as a way to encourage competition in the local telephone market. Instead of allowing the large companies to lower rates as their overhead costs dropped and squeeze out competition the CRTC froze the rates charged to urban customers. They then had the phone companies put that surplus cash into the accounts.



By 2006, competition in local phone service was well established. The debate over what to do with the money went as far as the Supreme Court, with consumer groups calling for the entire amount to be given back to customers and telephone companies calling for free rein to invest the funds.


Telecommunications expert Chris Diceman, a senior vice-president at the bond-rating agency DBRS Ltd. said the rebate was long overdue.


“This is really what the CRTC had intended from day one,” said Diceman.

[tjthemanto]

First time I am seeing BELL give something back ( ofcourse they are kind of being forced to give it back ..LOL ) ...they & ROGERS aka ROBBERS only know how to take & screw there customers ..LOL

[carlyincanada]

Wow, mom will be happy! She is now with Cogeco for phone but Bell keeps calling & calling her several times a week to come back...even tho she is on the no call list! How annoying!

[ginger150]

Wow, mom will be happy! She is now with Cogeco for phone but Bell keeps calling & calling her several times a week to come back...even tho she is on the no call list! How annoying!

It is annoying! They can get away with it because she had service with them previously...

[FallenPixels]

Its not quite Bell giving it back, its the CRTC who are letting Bell etc handle it because they have the list of customers, the phone companies wanted the keep the full amount for 'upgrades to their network'

I won't get one because I got rid of Bell because of their awful service

[mulock]

Why not NS?

[FallenPixels]

Perhaps NS did not have their rates temporarily inflated to allow competition?

[Cheap]

It seems that money is given to consumers only to be taken away at a later date.

For example, our taxes increased with HST, but we got money back in the form of an HST rebate cheque, only to have some utility services such as cable and hydro increase their rates.

Money was taken away from consumers, now the CRTC wants money to be given back to the consumers, sorry for my pessimistic outlook but what is going to happen next? Is a company going to increase their rates?

It seems like a never ending cycle of money given and money taken away.

[TaraF]

How does this work if you use to have the service but aren't currently a customer of theirs. Does it mean you are S.O.L? lol

[MelSprag]

So how do we go about getting the money back? and how does this work?

[ahatt]

Yes unfortunately, if you have had any kind of business dealings with a company in the last 18 months, they still are allowed to call you, even if you are on the Do Not Call list.

Wow, mom will be happy! She is now with Cogeco for phone but Bell keeps calling & calling her several times a week to come back...even tho she is on the no call list! How annoying!

[tjthemanto]

Bump

[tjthemanto]

[Insane]

Too bad I paid into the fund from 2002 to 2006 but I haven't been with bell since 2008 since I don't live in an area served by them. Guess others who didn't get gauged will get my money! Boo!

[pankaj]

The deferral account funds were created in 2002 as a way to encourage competition in the local telephone market. Instead of allowing the large companies to lower rates as their overhead costs dropped and squeeze out competition the CRTC froze the rates charged to urban customers. They then had the phone companies put that surplus cash into the accounts.