Massive Canadian Class-Action Cellphone Suit Is Approved

BeanBunny writes "A Saskatchewan, Canada court has ruled that a $12 billion class-action suit can proceed. The suit alleges that 'system access fees' that the cellphone companies have charged ($7-9 per month) are unfair and constitute price gouging. 'It is described as the largest class-action in Canadian history, potentially affecting every cellphone user in the country. Currently, there are 7,500 complainants signed onto the suit.'"

Comments

Re:no-win

[kidcharles]

SMS is a different protocol which requires a different infrastructure. The prices are high, but it's not just as easy as normal data transfer. I've heard about this, but in my opinion, bandwidth is bandwidth. If a wireless provider is sending two signals, one of which has a throughput that is thousands of times the data rate of the other signal, yet the signal with the smaller amount of data costs them thousands of times more than the larger signal to send, they are doing something really wrong. Of course the thing that is really wrong about text messaging is not the technical implementation but the pricing, for which there is simply no excuse. It's price gouging, pure and simple, and the US providers are collectively guilty of it.

Re:no-win

[athakur999]

That is BS. In GSM/UMTS networks at least, SMS messages are sent through the network via the MAP protocol and between the switch and mobile via DTAP. DTAP is required for any kind of mobile interaction and a provider must already have a MAP infrastructure in place to be able to handle practically any type of call.

The only additional piece of equipment required to handle SMS in a network is a SMS service center. All this is a database to receive SMS messages from an originating mobile and then send them back out to terminating mobile.

Using up bearer channels in their network for voice or data calls costs providers (both in dollars and in availability) far more than the simple signalling that SMS uses. There is no financial reason why a provider can provide unlimited voice calls but must charge $0.15 for an SMS message.