Telus, Bell start charging for incoming texts, government takes offense
Though it's a common practice in the US, charging customers for incoming text messages isn't terribly common up in Canada. Don't worry though, Canadians -- your days of being chronically undercharged are drawing to a close thanks to suspiciously closely-timed announcements from Bell and Telus that they'll start chalking up 15 cents per inbound message for anyone not on a messaging plan starting in August. The country's industry minister is none too pleased about the change (the dude must get like a thousand texts a day, after all), sending out letters to Bell and Telus' head honchos requesting meetings before the new charges take effect. We'll see where this goes, but we certainly wouldn't get our hopes up.Read - Bell, Telus customers to pay for incoming text messages
Read - Ottawa moves to forestall texting revolt [Via Smart Mobs]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Unknown @ Jul 10th 2008 10:07AM
Interior Minister? No, Jim Prentice is the Industry Minister. He's the same guy responsible for the spectrum auction now wrapping up, the one that will bring several new providers to Canada's cellular market - and hopefully end Rogers' (pronounced "Robbers") monopoly.
Chris Ziegler @ Jul 10th 2008 10:16AM
Snap, thanks for the correction!
mahoney @ Jul 10th 2008 12:59PM
Hate to tell you but the CRTC auction isn't going to change a thing. There's no requirement for anyone bidding on a slice of spectrum to actually use it for anything once they got it. I suspect most bidders will simply sit on it for a few years until Rogers has enough money to buy up the company and then get hold of the extra frequency.
MatthewJ @ Jul 10th 2008 11:26AM
Wait, what? I've said before that Americans are ripped off, but you get charged for RECEIVING TEXTS? My god that's insane!!
I hope you're being sarcastic with "chronically undercharged" too, you should flip that idea around!
Alareth @ Jul 10th 2008 5:21PM
Well, technically we only get charged if we actually open and read the text sent to us ...
Sarig @ Jul 10th 2008 7:43PM
Yeah, that's pretty crazy. Now, more than ever, I'm realising why texting never caught on in the US like here in Europe.
Julien @ Jul 10th 2008 2:11PM
The NDP has launched a petition:
http://www.ndp.ca/page/6577
Gary @ Jul 11th 2008 1:18AM
@mahoney: Re the auction winners. The license rules stipulate that they have to build to cover 45% to 55%, depending on license, of their POPs before the end a 5 year period. During the 5 year period, they are allowed to subdivide or sell their licenses but they must sell to an entity that meets the same restrictive covenants of the set aside spectrum. Only three carriers in Canada did not meet the covenants of the set aside spectrum - Rogers, Bell, and Telus. So the new entrants can sell their licenses but not to the three major incumbents. As well, if they haven't met the build criteria by the end of five years, they risk losing their license back to Industry Canada.
Most of the larger new entrants will start offering service using roaming sometime in mid to late 2009 and begin to build their networks to backfill their customers and market plans. However, other than the cableco based competitors, the others will probably have financial difficulties in the longer term. The Canadian market cannot support 4-6 carriers. The much larger US market can barely support 4-5 per market - evidence the recent wave of consolidation and Sprint's current troubles. Either way, with three new competitors in each market, get ready for much better plans - at least for 3-5 years.
Don't lock yourself into 3 year contracts this year!
More discussion on this on my blog: http://cellcanada.wordpress.com
Jamar @ Jul 14th 2008 12:32AM
Well, Japan is positively tiny compared to Canada and it comfortably supports 5 carriers (Softbank, DoCoMo, and au are the incumbents, Willcom and EMobile are the "others").