On February 28th 2010 my fiancée and I went to the Telus Store in Scarborough Town Centre. We wanted to know what offers were available to us seeing that our contract was up for renewal March 20th, 2010. We gave the store rep our account info and he told us based on our account we were eligible to get the Samsung R540 for $0 on a three year term... (We’ve now been with Telus for 6 years and the best they could do was to give us $50 off what was being offered to new customers). To say the least we weren’t really interested in this offer. I asked what type of offer they could make if we wanted iPhones. We were told that Telus wasn’t allow to discount the iPhone any further than what was already been offered to new customers, the best they could do was give us free $50 Bluetooth headsets. So the iPhone G3S 16GB was going to cost us $199 each on a 3 years term, so we said fine... (After all this is standard across most carriers). Now it came down to the monthly plan, because we didn’t have Smartphones before we only had a voice plan which for $72 (taxes/fees included) for both of us included: 200 daytime minutes each, unlimited evenings and weekends start from 6pm, unlimited Telus to Telus calling, Caller ID, Voicemail 3, 1000 call forwarding minutes each, per second billing & detail billing (no text messaging - that was 15 cents per). So I asked if we could keep our current voice plan and add a data plan, the rep told us that was not possible, we were told that we had to take a voice/data plan package. The rep show us the couples plan... so to get what we already had in our old plan with the addition of 50 more minutes, 3GB of data and unlimited text messaging it was going to cost us $170 a month ($100 for the plan, $7 each for 6pm early evenings/weekends, $15 each for Caller ID & unlimited text messaging fees and taxes). Clearly this wasn’t going to work; I told the rep that this was basically what I could get from Rogers except with them I would get a 15% bundle discount with the only difference being 2GB less data. After wasting at least 30 minutes to see if they were willing to do anything I asked the question if I cancelled today what it would cost and the rep told me “$20 for each remaining month on my contract” (I only had 20 days remaining). So we went to the Rogers Store in Scarborough Town Centre that day and switched our service... for a $135 a month we’re getting 400 shared minutes, 1GB data shared (in 23 days we only manage to use 150 MB), unlimited evenings and weekend starting at 6pm, unlimited calling between plan members anytime, unlimited text/email/picture messages, Caller ID and Voicemail Plus.
About a week later I got a bill from Telus for $213.22 so of course I called their client care and they explained to me that the termination fee was the greater of $100 or $20 for each remaining month. Okay but their store rep never told me of the $100 – I’m not exactly sure how many customers go into Telus’s store with their contract in hand that was signed almost 3 years ago especially when you’re only trying to see what they have to offer you. So now their store reps are unfamiliar with their terms of termination... seeing that they have to go over this almost every day when new customers sign on I’m really not sure how exactly this wasn’t mentioned to me; the store rep had my account info and our conversion started with me telling him that my contract was up for renewal. So after half an hour on the phone explaining if it really made sense that I would chose to pay $213.22 when I could have just stayed a month more and pay $72 and I would have been free from their contract, client care decided to meet me half way... they reduced the bill to $100.22 (which I paid, not worth ruining my credit score for $100). I was only expecting Telus to charge me $40 in cancellation but I guess they had to teach me a lesson. They can rest assure that I would not use or recommend their services in the future for many reasons beyond this recent experience. This is not to say that the other guys are any better but at least they make up for it in upgrades and credits. I’ve sent my complaint to the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services (CCTS), I’m not expecting anything from Telus but I just wanted to share my experience because its only through the power of social networking that companies will realize that consumers are no longer at their mercy and they need to change their behaviour.
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