By Joaquim P. Menezes
Crooks, criminals, thugs, money grubbers, gougers, sleaze bags – these and other choice epithets (many unprintable) – appearing since yesterday in myriad blog posts – describe what scores of Canadians think of two of this country's largest cellular service providers Bell Mobility and TELUS.
The trigger for this widespread outrage was the announcements made by the duo on Tuesday that later this summer they're going to start charging wireless customers, who do not subscribe to a text message bundle as part of their calling plan, 15 cents per incoming text message.
Bell's new pricing plan will kick in less than a month from now, on Aug. 8, while Telus will start charging customers for incoming messages on Aug. 24.
Frankly it's difficult to determine what's more offensive – the newly minted charge for incoming messages, or how the two carriers have sought to justify that.
A Telus spokesperson called the charge "moderate" – and told a major TV station that it's being imposed to "recover the cost of the investment Telus is making in the network to handle the exponential growth in text messaging."
And a Bell spokesperson claimed his company is "simply aligning [itself] with market realities."
Let's look more closely at these claims, which by the way rank pretty high on my bs meter.
First, the one about the charge being moderate.
As customers will have to fork out 15 cents for any incoming message – regardless of whether it's from a known party or not, or whether it's spam or not – the "moderate" claim can't be substantiated.
Users have no way to block unwanted messages. And to be forced to pay for something you don't want, but have no control over is outrageous.
As one blogger put it: "Maybe I should quit my job and become a text-message blackmailer. Imagine getting a text message saying, in effect, "Please send us $10 or we will spam you with 10 text messages per day indefinitely."
As to the "recovering network costs" and "aligning with market realities" bit – these don't wash either.
When the two carriers formulated their existing rate plans they presumably factored in the impact text messaging would have on their networks.
To now charge users after the fact for incoming messages is unfair, to say the least – and I won't take issue with those who call it a "cash grab."
As a source interviewed by our writer Brian Jackson notes: "The carriers are also looking to move pay-as-you-go customers to a monthly billing model." Read Brian's fabulous coverage of this issue on our site today.
And that's simply arm-twisting you into opting for a pricing plan – that you may not really need or want.