Canadian’s didn’t even make it to the Speech from the Throne before rates went up. Bell is accused of leading this charge.
Canada is widely known for having some of the most expensive rates in the world when it comes to cell phones and Internet access. The rates are so high, even American’s are grateful for the rates they get stuck with at times.
While Canadian ISPs sometimes maintain that Canada has a low population density, that excuse never really held up – especially when comparing prices to Australia. Ultimately, the fault lies largely on the fact that the market has little competition. All indications moving forward say that the problem is going to get worse.
Earlier this year, Rogers said that they are attempting to buy Shaw for $26 billion. Experts agree that this will cause cell phone and Internet rates to go up.
To make matters worse, the CRTC (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission) reversed a 2019 decision to keep cell phone and Internet rates lower. This after the CRTC chair was photographed having a beer with a Bell executive.
Throughout the 2021 election, one widely promised theme was various methods to lower Internet and cell phone rates. In response, we predicted that lowering Internet and cellphone rates was something that will not get delivered in this government.
Surprisingly, this prediction would be the fourth prediction to come true. This after accurately predicting a Liberal minority government, the fact that it would take a while for that to be declared, and a low voter turnout rate. We honestly didn’t think that prediction would come true so quickly, going faster than the speed of the Speech from the Throne.
Peter Nowak posted a screenshot of a notice from Bell, saying that rates are, in fact, going up:
Bell is jacking up wireless rates again, which means the others will follow suit if they haven't already. But, but, but… the government and #CRTC are telling us that prices are going down! pic.twitter.com/mWyT6K3JO6
— Peter Nowak (@peternowak) September 23, 2021
Bell is jacking up wireless rates again, which means the others will follow suit if they haven’t already. But, but, but… the government and #CRTC are telling us that prices are going down!
The screenshot shows that overage rates are going up from $10 for every 100MB to $13 for every 100MB. Further, long distance calling within Canada and going into the US is going up from 65 cents per minute to 75 cents per minute. All this starts on November, 2021 according to the screenshot.
In a followup tweet, Nowak also commented with this:
This overage price is pretty insane. $134 for the first gigabyte, then $150 for each GB after.
— Peter Nowak (@peternowak) September 24, 2021
This overage price is pretty insane. $134 for the first gigabyte, then $150 for each GB after.
With the government seemingly set to either largely ignore this issue once in session or propose a solution that doesn’t really help with this problem, this trend of constantly raising rates is seemingly destined to only continue. One fear is that other carries and ISP’s will simply follow suit as well. The CRTC, of course, isn’t helping things – especially with the aforementioned rate hike decision. With both government bodies not looking like they intend on fixing this problem, Canadians will continue to pay the price. Not a good look doing this in the midst of a pandemic, but who is going to stop them?
Drew Wilson on Twitter: @icecube85 and Facebook.
