How can he completely overlook the effect usage based billing has on usage? The vast majority of consumers and business simply can't afford to make full use of their connections because they've been capped far below what their connections could actually transfer. Providers can't continue to declare their's no need for improving their networks and then turn around and charge a premium to heavy data users under the guise of network congestion. Which is it? Are the networks congested or are they under-utilized? It can't be both.
I didn't even realize other canadians had a 'bandwidth hogs' stance until this whole fiasco happened and I talked to some non-tech savvy people who seemed to believe they were being charged more as low-bandwidth users to support the heavy users, rather than just being bilked by their ISPs. It seems to be a sad state of affairs where people have just accepted that rogers and bell are anti-competitive and it's acceptable for them to get together and price fix.
First of all, the average user should pay $50 a month for 60GB of bandwidth. That's just ridiculous. Second of all, having done the math, those caps don't seem to properly scale at all. Okay, I'm a heavy user. I accept that and I will pay more. For bell, that means the best I can hope for is 75GB at 25Mbps for $52.95, which means I could use up my cap in 6.8 hours at full bandwidth. For Rogers, I'd pay a whopping $99.99 for 50Mbps, but with a 175GB cap I could use that up in 7.9 hours.
I know A LOT of canadians who just want an unlimited plan.... they don't even really care how fast the line is. How can Bell, Rogers and the CRTC claim to be consumer-focused and not cater to us consumers?
Of course, I agree that you're rarely going to be redirected by an employee at one store to another... I just think that to say the use of mobile phones is a sign that stores can cut back on staffing or should be spending more money on alternative advertising strategies misses the point; A mobile phone is not the most effective method for comparison shopping (clearly there isn't a good way to find the best price online or people would do their research before leaving the house). I think it's more of a response to a lack of customer service and poor consumer confidence in the pricing at most retail stores.
If you ever get a chance, I'd like to hear your opinion on Canada's C-32 Bill or the new Digital Copyright Bill in Canada. As a Canadian myself, it seems like I've only just stumbled across it and yet it's dangerously close to becoming law. There are some pretty interesting and game changing amendments in there, but almost no-one knows about it. Once again it seems like our conservative government is siding with corporations behind closed doors while the average Canadian has given up caring about politics altogether.
Customers using their cellphones in retail stores is more indicative of bad customer service than anything else. If the staff is neither able to adequately answer your questions nor have some insight into what others are charging for similar products, then it makes sense that customers would be willing to take the longer and more awkward route of standing in the store with their mobile browser out.
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UBB
How can he completely overlook the effect usage based billing has on usage? The vast majority of consumers and business simply can't afford to make full use of their connections because they've been capped far below what their connections could actually transfer. Providers can't continue to declare their's no need for improving their networks and then turn around and charge a premium to heavy data users under the guise of network congestion. Which is it? Are the networks congested or are they under-utilized? It can't be both.
I didn't even realize other canadians had a 'bandwidth hogs' stance until this whole fiasco happened and I talked to some non-tech savvy people who seemed to believe they were being charged more as low-bandwidth users to support the heavy users, rather than just being bilked by their ISPs. It seems to be a sad state of affairs where people have just accepted that rogers and bell are anti-competitive and it's acceptable for them to get together and price fix.
First of all, the average user should pay $50 a month for 60GB of bandwidth. That's just ridiculous. Second of all, having done the math, those caps don't seem to properly scale at all. Okay, I'm a heavy user. I accept that and I will pay more. For bell, that means the best I can hope for is 75GB at 25Mbps for $52.95, which means I could use up my cap in 6.8 hours at full bandwidth. For Rogers, I'd pay a whopping $99.99 for 50Mbps, but with a 175GB cap I could use that up in 7.9 hours.
I know A LOT of canadians who just want an unlimited plan.... they don't even really care how fast the line is. How can Bell, Rogers and the CRTC claim to be consumer-focused and not cater to us consumers?
Re: Re: Customer Service
Of course, I agree that you're rarely going to be redirected by an employee at one store to another... I just think that to say the use of mobile phones is a sign that stores can cut back on staffing or should be spending more money on alternative advertising strategies misses the point; A mobile phone is not the most effective method for comparison shopping (clearly there isn't a good way to find the best price online or people would do their research before leaving the house). I think it's more of a response to a lack of customer service and poor consumer confidence in the pricing at most retail stores.
C-32
If you ever get a chance, I'd like to hear your opinion on Canada's C-32 Bill or the new Digital Copyright Bill in Canada. As a Canadian myself, it seems like I've only just stumbled across it and yet it's dangerously close to becoming law. There are some pretty interesting and game changing amendments in there, but almost no-one knows about it. Once again it seems like our conservative government is siding with corporations behind closed doors while the average Canadian has given up caring about politics altogether.
Customer Service
Customers using their cellphones in retail stores is more indicative of bad customer service than anything else. If the staff is neither able to adequately answer your questions nor have some insight into what others are charging for similar products, then it makes sense that customers would be willing to take the longer and more awkward route of standing in the store with their mobile browser out.