Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

dslreports.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 100 posts

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#51

Post by tonyarkles »

deathchill wrote: post #7

It's almost as terrible as the car insurance market in BC: http://ihateicbc.com/icbcs-dirty-little-secret.html BC only has one car insurance provider so they're free to set the prices as they see fit. They even try and pretend that they're doing it to help keep prices low as competition would only raise the prices for everyone (yes, they really said this).

It's fascinating that ICBC is so bad. In Saskatchewan, we've got SGI (another government car insurance monopoly), but their prices are quite good, and they run it such that they don't really make a profit (if there's a surplus, they write cheques back to people).

From what I can tell from other peoples' comments throughout this thread, SaskTel seems to be in a similar boat. The population and economy of Sask. doesn't really support, imho, a business case for the level of service SaskTel provides, but the government provides it anyway. I've been extremely happy with my SaskTel service for years, and now that they've moved to GSM, things just keep getting better.

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#52

Post by dhughes »

I have cell service with Bell Aliant (eastern Canada) and my data is horrible!

My phone a Samsung Galaxy SII on Bell's HSPA+ network which from what I understand can be anywhere from 21Mbps to 42Mbps but my phone is only capable of a max of 21Mbps. I don't expect to get 21Mbps or even 15Mbps but most days it's 0.3 or 1Mbps maybe 5Mbps to 9Mbps on a good day. Outright lies or incompetence or both to say such a thing and not have anywhere near what they promise.

Bell's excuse is the network is busy with other users but I test it at all hours of the day and each day and weekend but it's never consistent. They advertise "HSPA+ 21Mbps" but make excuse after excuse once you're a customer that you'll never ever see that.

I complained to the CRTC Donna Shewfelt Client Services wrote back to me gave me a case number 'CRTC Case ID: 548491' but then "The telecommunications industry has established an independent consumer agency, the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services (CCTS)"

and

"Given the concerns you have raised, we believe this complaint is more properly within the scope of the CCTS and have forwarded your complaint to them."

That was September 22 of this year (2011) and not one reply since then from any of them.

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#53

Post by mladenkovacevic »

JonLim wrote: post #24
FreeKill wrote: post #2

I doubt anyone who has ever had to deal with one of the big 3 in Canada (Rogers, Telus, or Bell) would argue against this point. Canadians really need to push for an open system that allows foreign competition to enter the marketplace. Until we do, the status quo is simply going to continue to press the advantage they have at the expense of the Canadian consumers.

I would love to have an idea of what we CAN do. This is the one thing in my life where I can't vote with my wallet. I only really have three viable choices for wireless right now: Rogers, Bell, and Telus.

Have you tried one of the small guys struggling to compete against the big 3? Mobilicity, Wind or Public Mobile. I am with Mobilicity and pay $35 for unlimited everything (one of the amzing early plans they had.. you can still get he same for $40 or so) and that includes data, global text messaging and North American long distance.A couple of caveats are that plans are metro-area limited so if you go out of any of their zones (Toronto, Vancouver, Ottawa, Calgary...) you are roaming at about 25 cents per minute and if you need fast data forget it (highest I get is about 3Mbit/s). Some changes are coming though so all of us with the little carriers are kinda unsure what's going to happen - Mobilicity's CEO was just fired, CRTC declared that the small guys have to bid for the same LTE spectrum along with the big 3 (which is what the main Wind investor in the article above is complaining about).

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#54

Post by throwaway64 »

matdwyer wrote: post #49
cheez wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

6GB is not unlimited

Hence why I said "basically". I tether daily (including streaming the occasional leafs game, radio, etc) and haven't gone over 6GB.

6GB is a few dozen youtube videos, thats pretty far from even "basically"

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#55

Post by derefr »

nobody31415926 wrote: post #27
snowwindwaves wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why Skype In (Skype Online Number) - where people call a POTS number and get your skype account, isn't available in canada. What is stopping everyone from making calls from mobile phones over data networks? surely skype is available for iphone and android?

Data costs in canada are even higher than voice costs! skype is only available on some androids and charges calls against your voice minutes.

> Data costs in canada are even higher than voice costs!

Most carriers have introduced a data-only plan, technically specifically to make iPad 3Gs work, that isn't nearly as gouging as the data plans for phones. You can get it set up for an arbitrary SIM card, then put that card into a phone: http://www.wifitalk.ca/iphone/ipad-3g-sim-gives-iphone-data-...

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#57

Post by maximilianburke »

jbarham wrote: post #50

By way of comparison, I'm living in Melbourne, Australia, and pay $55/month for the Nexus S w/ unlimited calls within Australia (including to other mobile phones), unlimited texts (IIRC) and 500 MB of data. That's for a one-year plan w/ Vodafone, and I didn't pay anything up-front for the phone. Needless to say I'm looking forward to upgrading to the Galaxy Nexus soon. :) My wife has the the same phone and same plan…

BC insurance, from my experience, isn't really a problem. Most quotes I've received in markets where there is a free(r) market for insurance often are considerably higher than what BC drivers pay through ICBC, especially if the driver is under 25.

Case in point, I renewed my auto insurance today with ICBC and paid $1470 for 12 months of insurance for a 2007 Mazda 3. The policy includes $2,000,000 liability, collision and comprehensive coverage with $300 deductibles, plus rental car coverage. In the last five years I was rear-ended at a stop light and my car was vandalized once. The equivalent quote from Geico was $2385 which only included $500,000 of liability insurance.

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#58

Post by matdwyer »

throwaway64 wrote: post #54
matdwyer wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hence why I said "basically". I tether daily (including streaming the occasional leafs game, radio, etc) and haven't gone over 6GB.

6GB is a few dozen youtube videos, thats pretty far from even "basically"

Seriously? I have yet to meet a single person who has gone over 6GB on a mobile plan (even with tethering). In fact Rogers put out a statistic that something like only 3 people went over 6GB in the first month they offerred it.

As I said, I literally have streamed entire leafs (NHL) games and had plenty of space left to do normal things. If I'm not mistaken, Youtube data rate is 300kbps, which is 132 MB/hour. So 6GB would give you theoretically 46.5 hours of youtube videos. You're trying to tell me that that isn't "basically unlimited"? Seriously?

Hell, basic wired internet in Canada starts with a 25GB cap. 6GB is more then 99% of people need for mobile.

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#59

Post by [deleted] »

jbarham wrote: post #50

By way of comparison, I'm living in Melbourne, Australia, and pay $55/month for the Nexus S w/ unlimited calls within Australia (including to other mobile phones), unlimited texts (IIRC) and 500 MB of data. That's for a one-year plan w/ Vodafone, and I didn't pay anything up-front for the phone. Needless to say I'm looking forward to upgrading to the Galaxy Nexus soon. :) My wife has the the same phone and same plan…

[deleted]

Re: Canada's Telecom Market is Rigged, says Wind Mobile backer Naguib Sawiris

#60

Post by gyardley »

jbarham wrote: post #50

By way of comparison, I'm living in Melbourne, Australia, and pay $55/month for the Nexus S w/ unlimited calls within Australia (including to other mobile phones), unlimited texts (IIRC) and 500 MB of data. That's for a one-year plan w/ Vodafone, and I didn't pay anything up-front for the phone. Needless to say I'm looking forward to upgrading to the Galaxy Nexus soon. :) My wife has the the same phone and same plan…

The typical Canadian will irrationally defend any policy that differs from the equivalent policy in America, because the typical Canadian's sense of national identity is 10% hockey and 90% 'we're different from the Americans'.

We're never going to deregulate and allow a little free-market competition to lower prices as long as these proposals can be criticized as 'Americanization' or 'the American way'. It's not complacency that ties Canadians to our goofy oligopolies, it's our own misguided nationalism.

Post reply on HN