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TELUS Forcing Customers Off Unlimited Plans
An anonymous reader writes "Canadian telco TELUS sold a bunch of (expensive) Unlimited EV-DO aircard accounts last winter and are now summarily canceling them or forcing people to switch to much less valuable plans. TELUS is citing 'Violations,' but their Terms Of Service (see #5) are utterly vague and self-contradictory. The TELUS plans were marketed as being unlimited, without the soft/hard caps that the other providers had at the time. They were purchased by a lot of rural Canadians who had no other choice except dialup. Now TELUS is forcing everyone to switch from a $75 Unlimited plan to a $65 1GB plan, and canceling those who won't switch. Have a look at the thread at Howardforums, a discussion of the TELUS ToS (in red at the bottom), an EV-DO blogger who's been a victim, a post at Electronista, and of course Verizon getting fined for doing the same thing! Michael Geist has taken an interest as well."
Sounds like bait and switch...
Except on closer examination it's the legal version... GOD how I love living in Canada! On the plus side, at least they didn't introduce an "Unlimited system access fee", claim it to be some sort of vague government forced thing, and then charge more for the fee (that is mandatory) than the service plan costs.
Note to self: stop giving Telus more ideas on how to rape my ass!
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Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
I guarentee that I never went over 5 GB unless I got a LOT of spam that got through my server and was filtered on my end. They could not even tell me my usage when they cancelled mine. Just that they were cancelling everyones.
They are obligated to maintain the service for however long the contract says they need to maintain service. If they ask nicely, I might be willing to help them. But they have absolutely no right to just break any contract because they screwed up.
There's a question of what the contract says exactly, but that's what courts are for. I hope that someone with deep pockets gets this going as a class action lawsuit, and sues Telus into bankruptcy.
Newsflash: corporations can't just do whatever the hell they want.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
At some point we have to realize that cell phones and internet access are pretty much not a privilege any more. All of us should have access to these shared resources (the tubes).
Disclaimer: American viewpoint.
I agree that these services are nearly necessitates in today's society. Communication is king. It is required. Broadcast TV has been made a free service based on government regulation. On the other hand, electricity and heat are more necessary than communication and they are in the same competitive mode to keep prices low.
Here's the difference that I see, though, between all these services... if the government was to start providing these as "free services" (like the majority of roads are) they are basically saying "this is as good as it gets". Competition for cheaper methods of delivering heat and electricity has historically kept these prices low, so these industries is well regulated. However, duopolistic behavior by Verizon and AT&T have caused the telephone companies to practice the same tricks that resulted in the original breakup of AT&T in 1984. Prices are what the phone companies want them to be and customers cannot elect fair "lower cost" options (pay-as-you-go is a joke at a quarter a minute and $30 for 450 minutes per month is excessive... and there is no middle ground).
Support the 30 Hour Work Week!!!
Telus used to be a government run telco. We never seemed to have any problems with the service and it was cheaper than it is now.
Yup, we certainly are. Unfortunately, as bad as Telus is, my experience is that Bell and Rogers are worse. And that is the full cartel of wireless companies in Canada; so you get to pick bad (Telus), worse (Rogers), or worst (Bell).
Aliant (Bell) double billed me 11 months in a row. And they cut off my service, every month, for 'non-payment'. So at the end I had built up a credit of $950 on my account, and yet each month they still debited my account and then disconnected for non payment. When I said cancel the contract they argued over the cancellation fee. They finally relented though. I don't think they are stupid though, just pure incarnate evil.
Rogers on the hand were a lot nicer. Just stupid beyond belief. My father started calling them 'Rogers Clueless' instead of 'Rogers Wireless' because they screwed up his bill, my sisters bill, mine, and almost any Rogers customers I've talked to. My favorite screwup is when they simply don't take the money for weeks or months because of some 'issue' in their system. Morans!
So as of yesterday, based on the recommendations of two friends, I now have a Telus phone here on my desk and hope against hope they don't screw me too badly. The two friends have assured me Telus doesn't suck that match. I'll let you know when the two year contract runs out.
Here in Pittsburgh, Comcast dropped 4 channels from their analog lineup, and are charging customers the same price. I didn't care about two of them, but BET, G4, TruTV, and (believe it or not) The Style Network were all channels that had shows we watched. I talked to a Comcast drone over the phone about this, and he said that it was a business decision to allow for more HD channels. I realize that there is a difference between wireless carriers and cable TV companies, but the concept is the same -- we're being invited to pay more for less. Now, I get one single channel from Cable that I do not get over the air -- TBS. There aren't any competitors I can switch to, even though a separate cable company services the folks across the street. Friggin' sucks!
Zhrodague.net - I do projects and stuff too.
Dealing with telus for me was nothing but severe pain in the backside. They care nothing about customer satisfaction. They will screw you over and cheat you out of your money as much as they can, and when you finally leave, they then proceed to harass you with endless calls and try to con you into switching back with false incentives.
Here is an example of their borderline criminal conduct. I used to subscribe to their home phone service. I had it on automatic payment (big mistake) One day, I noticed that my bill had been steadily increased from $30/mo for a single line to $40, $60, and then as high $80/mo for the past few months.
I called them trying to sort it out. After several hours of navigating through the labyrinth of automated voice menu (no, 0 for operator did not work) I finally got put on hold for over an hour to speak with a human, and was cut off while waiting in the queue. After a few tries I finally got though, and got an explanation. Apparently, they had been taking the liberty to 'introduce new services' onto my account, without notifying me, and took my not noticing and canceling them a sign of agreement to adapt those service.
They of course, refused to refund the charges because I had been 'enjoying the additional services' so I requested to cancel them on the spot. Apparently I could not do that either because I don't have this password somehow set on my account.
While I was contemplating canceling the whole account and start over with a new number, with the hassle of informing all my contacts of a number change, Shaw called to promote their $25/mo digital line. So I switched. For the past year I have not paid over the $25/mo I agree to pay. There had not been additional features secretly added to my line.
However, Telus was not happy about my switching. They called about 3 times a week asking me to switch back. Their call usually started with a pompous voice asking me to identify myself to them. They even demanded that I explained to them why I switched, to which their representatives received some colourful words from me and a request to never calling back again.
Then they called again offering me ridiculous deals such as a comparatively lower 3-month INTRODUCTORY rate (and it would eventually go back up) if I switched my phone AND internet services to them. At this point, I started threatening with a harassment suit if they didn't stop calling. The call finally stopped.
And you wonder why telus spends so much on their 'the future is friendly' PR campaign to tell people how well they treat their customers.
Telus is a joke, no way I'd ever do business with them again.
OTOH, a friend of mine lost his cell phone so I suggest calling up Telus with the intent to leave because they don't offer the iPhone to see what they might do(let's be clear, he doesn't want an iPhone, but we know this particular phone is going to receive some sort of response from the Telus rep.). Not mentioning the lost phone to them at this point, he proceeds to tell them that he would like one of them new-fangled iPhones that everyone is talking about. Telus rep says sorry we don't have that phone. So he says oh okay, I'd like to cancel my service then. They proceed to go through the big laminated list of reasons the iPhone is crap, and he just simply says yeah, that's fine, I'll just cancel, how much is it to buy out my contract?
At this point they go ahead and offer him a new Blackberry Pearl at no charge, and he informs them that this wouldn't be sufficient and he'd still like to proceed with canceling his services. They step up to the plate again and offer him an unlimited data plan in addition to his current Telus package at no charge, for the balance of his contract (2 1/2 years).
Of course, he accepts this offer. So, although I hate Telus, sometimes they serve their purpose, such as situations like the one above.
Of course after he finishes talking with the Telus rep he proceeds to call them back immediately to report his lost phone so that it is deactivated.
This was approximately a month and a half ago and so far so good, Telus is honouring their offer of unlimited data, and he's still paying the same $48.xx a month he was paying prior to this escapade, and enjoying his new Blackberry phone.