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Rogers Joins Telus In Seeking National Regulation
silentbrad writes "Canada's largest mobile service provider is urging the federal telecom regulator to implement a mandatory national consumer protection code (PDF; actual filing with the CRTC) in order to defuse the threat posed by a growing hotchpotch of provincial regulations for wireless services. Rogers Communications Inc. submitted that proposal to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission in an application late Thursday. In doing so, Rogers becomes the second major carrier to ask the CRTC to resume active regulation of the terms and conditions for wireless service contracts, a practice it largely abandoned during the 1990s. Nonetheless, those regulatory powers, while latent, remain in the Telecommunications Act, meaning the CRTC can still exercise its authority over those matters."
Honestly I would have thought Telus' request to be a move knowing it would cause problems for Rogers, seeing as Telus and Bell have a reciprocal network sharing agreement and so tend to collude on most matters.
I have to be missing something here.
When groups of incumbent telecom providers gather together to protect consumers, it's usually to protect consumers from the distraction of non-incumbent providers striving to provide superior and less expensive service.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
You defuse bombs, and language may have morphed so that you can defuse any type of threat.
Diffuse means spread out like the potential regulations.
Getting the cheap/free cellphone in Canada often involves signing up for long 3 year plan with huge penalties if you quit early.
I'm not sure of all the provinces, but I know that both Quebec and Manitoba have new laws in place requiring better contract disclosure and limiting those penalties.
I suspect that Rogers and Telus are afraid the other provinces will enact the same or stronger legislation.
A "hotchpotch" is a mutton stew. Do you mean a "hodgepodge"? :-) :-)
Lesson: Never edit when you're hungry
Oh I am so relieved to hear there is no conflict of interest involved in his appointment or execution of his office. Who appointed him?
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
I can see it now in their boardroom:
The Board: "Gahh! The threat! The Threat! It is so opaque and solid! What will we do?"
VP for Regulatory Affairs: "I know! Let's diffuse it!"
VP for Queen's English: "Wait, don't you mean 'defuse?' "
CEO: "Quiet, peon! I agree; let's diffuse the threat!"
The Board: "Yaaaay! More bonuses!"
Not to argue that there isn't a conflict of interest, but I guess that the alternative would be to appoint someone who hasn't worked in the telecom industry. I'm not sure which would end up worse. Having someone in charge who is old friends with the people running the telcos, or having somebody in charge who has no idea about telecommunications networks are run, and has never worked in the business.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
I worked for a local canadian ISP for many years. We could buy local-loops from the incumbent phone company for 12 dollars per line, per month, and sell DSL. Or, we would have been able to if the incumbent decided that "those are alarm loop lines only.". the crtc should have leveled the playing field by saying that one line is one price, not 2 prices for 2 different industries. the carrier wanted to charge 160/mo per line (when they sold dsl for 40/mo to end-users) to us, and 12 to alarm companies for literally the same line. The CRTC's response was "its not a monopoly. even though tax money paid for the infrastructure before it was privatized and the rates have since gone up, the cable company can compete with the phone company. so its not a monopoly and we dont have to step in". Years of frustrated letters and phone conversations about this anticompetitive business practice ended nowhere. the 30 or 40 isps in my city? basically all gone. 2 remain in any real sense, the cable, and phone company :) almost 15 years later look where we are now? UBB being pushed by the largest carriers, fairly expensive internet for developed countries, etc. Until the CRTC stops sucking the wang of bell, rogers, and shaw, we will slide further into the abyss.
ca*net was supposed to provide 10mbit fiber about a decade ago to most canadian homes, and how did that work, with all the "boohoo. we want 20 minute hold times for tech support, unlimited price fixing and deep packet inspection, or we are going to stop giving our legislators money". i say this in the most cordial manner possible to our CRTC and spokespersons from our incumbents. rim a thousand goats and contract some goat herpes on your stupid faces.
If you, as a consumer, have the option of a small ISP? Take it. I could be with the telco, or the cableco. but i spend more money, but i get better service in every regard.
Or having a researcher or economist that has spent a lot of time analyzing the system. You don't have to work in a system to see the flaws... and sometimes working in it blinds you to what needs to be done. The only problem I would have is if they let someone in that thinks the internet is a series of tubes.
Of course they want national laws. It'll be much easier to screw customers over if they can figure out national loopholes, a lot less work for their legal team.
I have zero doubt that this is a ploy to create a system where newcomers have to "respect" a regulatory regime that would make newcomers behave just like the incumbents.
One of the things that the old players probably fear the most is newcomers doing "evil" things such as offering data at a low price without making the customer first sign up for a bunch of crap they don't want. Also I can see them somehow figuring out a ruleset that makes 3 year contracts a de-facto standard.
In Atlantic Canada I am counting the days until I can dump Telus for one of the two new players coming this spring.
I find it quite amusing that the carriers are asking for guidelines around this. Individual provinces chose to enact laws because their residents were getting screwed by the cell companies. Had the cell companies not done this to begin with, the provinces would have left well enough alone. I hope the feds step in and enact extremely consumer-friendly policies, if for no other reason that to teach these guys a lesson. Or even, better, the feds to do nothing and force the carriers to conform to individual provincial rules - it'll be 10 times the work for them.
In some ways Canada' s policies and agencies are far more progressive and useful than their American counterparts, however some of them just make me cringe. The CRTC is a prime example, I didn't think you could be more of the telecoms little bitch than the FCC, but apparently you can. When the companies from the industry you are supposed to be regulating ask you to regulate (aka do your job) you know something is wrong.
Rogers, Telus (or Bell for that matter) have never had the customers interest in mind. In canada we pay the highest data fees in the first world and we have the most impossible contracts to escape from; Rogers by far is most sociopathic corporation i have ever had the misfortune of dealing with. Whatever the telecoms in Canada want it isnt good for the customer.
When anyone has to comply with multiple regulations for the same thing conflicts can and usually do occur. One regulation may focus on one aspect and give the industry a break on another aspect while a second regulation may do the exact opposite.
For example;
Province A regulation states the maximum contract length is 2 years and the maximum monthly penalty is 1/12 of the contract value. This regulation focuses on the contract length while giving a break on the cancellation penalty.
Province B regulation stated the maximum contract length be 3 years and the maximum monthly penalty be 1/36 of the contract value. This regulation focuses on the cancellation penalty while allowing longer contracts.
To comply with both regulations industry would have to have 2 year contracts with maximum monthly penalty being 1/36 of the contract value; the worst of both worlds.
Now do that for 10 provinces and see what can happen. Each province will try to balance the regulations between the needs of the people and the needs of industry. The problem comes when industry has to comply with the harshest parts of all regulations. By doing this all semblance of balance is gone.
There are two solutions to this issue;
1. A national regulation; a simple solution that allows for a single contract for anyone in Canada.
2. Separate contracts for each province; Complex as the company has to create and maintain ten different contracts. Difficult for customer service as it is easy to confuse ten similar contracts leading to misinformation and confusion. Difficult to advertise as commercials and literature would be different in each province. Considering I can watch a number of out of province channels I may be presented with a number of different contracts that are not available in my province. Confusing to anyone who moves between provinces as their contract may change to comply with local regulations.
Maybe the solution to this issue is to change the CRTC to be more responsive to the people's needs rather than create ten different regulations.
i did the opposite and now I'm with MTS unlimited 3G data for $75/month. Rogers refuses to offer that option so they can DIAF. Granted I brought my own unlocked Android phone so I'm on month to month.. but that's a bonus as well. MTS's biggest failure is in their still pathetic phone selection. I almost think someone at RIM is a major shareholder and refuses to let them offer anything that isn't a blackberry.
are former Assistant Director at Bell and a President at Rogers the only ones who have an idea about telecommunication networks?
rogers... is that you?..