Mark Carney needs to unite Canada, right?听
I have a solution,听and it has to do with our telecoms.
Show me a Canadian who doesn’t feel deep dread when something goes wrong with their internet, phone and television services.
Incorrect charges.听Ever-rising monthly bills. Glitchy services. Hours (sometimes months) spent trying to resolve these issues.
And now, new national data shows Canadians are bringing these beefs with our triopoly of telecoms to the industry’s national ombudsman in record numbers.
The “mid-year report” from the Commission for Complaints for Telecom-television Services (CCTS), released on Wednesday, is showing a 12 per cent spike in consumer complaints.
You might think, well, it’s easy to complain.听
Not exactly.
Like Hazel Maki, the retired arts teacher from South Porcupine, Ont., who mistakenly overpaid Koodo by about $13,000 last summer and spent nine months trying to get a refund, I, too, made a boo boo while rushing to pay bills online last month. I paid the wrong telecom company.听
Here’s a tip: If you have “payees” in your online bank account that you no longer do business with, delete them. Now.
When I initially set up this payee’s profile more than a decade ago, I stupidly called them “phonecableinternet” instead of the company’s actual name.听
The company that got my money acknowledged my accidental payment and promised to reimburse me.听
A few weeks later, I got a cheque (!) 鈥 with听someone else’s name on it.
I reported the problem to the company by email and phone. After an hour on the phone, I was told the company can issue a new cheque 鈥 but it will still have someone else’s name on it.听
The agent apologized that she couldn’t be of more help, and then asked me to hang on to complete a survey on how she did. I didn’t.
Maybe, I thought, this would be a good chance to see how the ombudsman’s office works. I did not expect to have to complete a 20-page form to report the problem.听
But I did. And I realized something: From Aug. 1, 2024 to Jan. 31, 2025, more than 11,000 other Canadians did the very same thing, according to CCTS’ latest report.听
Despite the time and effort they’d already taken trying to troubleshoot their telecom problems with the companies directly, more than 11,000 people grinded their way through a 20-page form to escalate their concerns.
Think about that.
That these consumers aren’t accepting “sorry, can’t help” as a final answer makes me proud to be Canadian.
Wireless complaints made up half of all issues raised with the听ombudsman’s office between August and January.
Internet service accounted for a quarter of complaints, an increase the听CCTS attributed to a surprise hike in rental fees for Rogers’ TV boxes.听
Consumers who thought they听had听“locked in” a monthly service fee were upset to find Rogers charging $7 for every additional box in their household.
The company said its contracts state equipment rental costs can fluctuate because of “rising costs to deliver the latest technology.”听
Speaking of rising costs, the federal government鈥檚 found Canadian consumers pay the highest telecom prices in the world, along with Japan and the U.S.
Telus, which owns Koodo, slid into the ombudsman’s top spot for the first time as the most-complained-about company, edging out听Rogers by a percentage point for the dubious distinction.
(I should note here that Mrs. Maki did finally receive the interest payment that Koodo promised her on her $13,000 overpayment.)
Bell was not far behind. Shaw Communications, acquired by Rogers in April 2023, entered the fray as “one of the five most complained-about providers for the first time in the last five years,” with 9.6 per cent of complaints received, driven by complaints about rental equipment and contract issues.
Fido (owned by Rogers) rounded out the top five with 6.8 per cent of all听complaints.
“Canadians rely on their phone, TV and internet services every day for work, to learn and for play,鈥 CCTS commissioner Howard Maker said. “Unresolved issues around billing, quality of service and contractual commitments for these services can be quite stressful.”
The stress, the unreliable services, the skyrocketing costs and the hours Canadians have spent on hold are all symptoms of one big problem that听our prime minister-designate has the power to solve.
It feels like a good time, Mr. Carney, to bust up the Big Three.
What do you think?
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