Bell cuts phone service to family struggling to pay surprise $1,800 bill (lol)

[rage2]

Hilarious that this is actually considered news. Entitled people crack me up.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bel...bill-1.5035728

TL;DR

Family has a phone plan, daughter texts someone in US thousands of times. She gets warnings. She ignore warnings. Racks up $1800. Dad pissed warning didn't go to him. Bell emails dad if he doesn't pay his service is getting disconnected. He doesn't see those warnings, might have ended up in Spam folder. Work is slow so now dad is fed up with Bell and will go elsewhere. Wah wah wah.

[firebane]

And ironically.. .its rage posting about it

[Tik-Tok]

"We just feel like they're bullying us," said Joy Zylstra. "I don't know how they're able to get away with this."

Stop making us personally responsible for our bills!!!

[firebane]

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Stop making us personally responsible for our bills!!!

Adulting is hard.

[ExtraSlow]

I have something on my account that cuts data when it reaches a certain amount over my plan. Is such a thing available for a certain amount of dollars over your plan? It should be and it should be mandatory.

[JRSC00LUDE]

I left my water running in my kitchen sink for 3 weeks while I was on vacation, those bullies at "City Hall" think I should pay for the WHOLE WATER BILL!!!!!

[msommers]

Family fail, cries to media, media able to get bill reduced. History will repeat itself.

Bell should just say GFY

[rx7boi]

Wait until they switch to another provider, someone in the family does the same shit again and they find that there's no difference between TELUS, Bell, and Rogers.

That said, they did try to put $400 towards the bill and just needed more time. $1800 can be a bit of change for what I assume to be an low income family.

[jaylo]

I smell a GoFundMe starting up...

[Doozer]

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I have something on my account that cuts data when it reaches a certain amount over my plan. Is such a thing available for a certain amount of dollars over your plan? It should be and it should be mandatory.

According to the article, this fell through a loophole in the system:

Following complaints about teens running up data overage fees on shared phone plans, the CRTC, Canada's telecom regulator, added protections to the Wireless Code in 2017: it mandated that the account holder must approve all data charges beyond $50.

Unfortunately for the Zylstras, the same rule doesn't apply to texting charges.

I guessing "texting" data is different from all other data...

[triplep]

I find it funny that they mention they have a business plan for their cell service. I bet the full amount is being deducted in the business yet I am sure the daughter does absolutely nothing for the business nor the wife. Would be funny if "CRA" bullied them and denied the expenses in the company and tacked on a taxable benefit for using the company's phone line.

[Xtrema]

14 year olds still texting each other?

I thought they are all IG this, sanpchat that.

[ExtraSlow]

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I guessing "texting" data is different from all other data...

This relic of history is maddening. Many carries are getting away from it though.

[Swank]

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Many carries are getting away from it though.

I can't find any info about that, help! I still find texting to be the most prominent way that people message each other in my personal and professional circles.

[jltabot]

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According to the article, this fell through a loophole in the system:



I guessing "texting" data is different from all other data...

It could be applied to MMS. Although data is required to be turned on to send pictures via SMS, makes sense since it isn't using a strictly data based (???) messaging service like imessage or whatsapp.

Stupid gonna stupid

[LilDrunkenSmurf]

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I can't find any info about that, help! I still find texting to be the most prominent way that people message each other in my personal and professional circles.

The only people that text, are my family. Everyone else uses Facebook Messenger, What's App, or Google Hangouts.

[ExtraSlow]

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I can't find any info about that, help! I still find texting to be the most prominent way that people message each other in my personal and professional circles.

I mean carriers getting away from charging for each text. Not getting away from offering that product. I didn't make that clear.

[ThePenIsMightier]

I'll play Devil's Advocate and say Fuck Bell.
I guess those electrons were quite costly and it's totally fair for them to immediately require full payment on a bill that was 20x higher than normal so they could recoup all those "costs" that they are carrying for a bunch of extra texts. You know... Those costs?
I thought the new regulations that came in about 2+ years ago were supposed to curb these issues. The same regulations that the Big 3 spent millions to fight in ad campaigns. I thought they had higher obligations to notify their customers of wild overages to prevent this. I hope they didn't technically meet those obligations and they get nothing but irregardless they should not be demanding full payment within a month for something so extraordinary.
Again, fuck Bell. Canadians pay some of the highest rates in the developed world for cellular service that is essentially a commodity.
Adulting is hard but not being a corporate cunt is showing to be harder in this instance.

[rage2]

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I'll play Devil's Advocate and say Fuck Bell.
I guess those electrons were quite costly and it's totally fair for them to immediately require full payment on a bill that was 20x higher than normal so they could recoup all those "costs" that they are carrying for a bunch of extra texts. You know... Those costs?

Does what it costs them matter? I mean it's clear it doesn't cost them that much when they offer an unlimited package for $12/month. Who are you to decide if they have a wildly profitable option that really only stupid people would use?

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I thought the new regulations that came in about 2+ years ago were supposed to curb these issues. The same regulations that the Big 3 spent millions to fight in ad campaigns. I thought they had higher obligations to notify their customers of wild overages to prevent this.

They do. They were notified. They were ignored.

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Again, fuck Bell. Canadians pay some of the highest rates in the developed world for cellular service that is essentially a commodity.
Adulting is hard but not being a corporate cunt is showing to be harder in this instance.

I mean I'm not defending Bell or anything, as you're right, cellular service is expensive as fuck here. To be fair, I would be more than happy to continue paying what I pay for the level of service that we receive here. I travel a lot, and I've mentioned this many times, whenever I land back in Canada, I'm back to 2019 and mobile internet speeds are normal. Everywhere else I've traveled, either there's a ton of shitty spots, or massive congestion where you can barely load a web page.

We are spoiled here in Canada in terms of performance + reliability. Anywhere I am in the city, I can fire up a TV stream in perfect quality over mobile networks, at times even better than whatever place I'm at with their free wifi.

[ThePenIsMightier]

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Does what it costs them matter? I mean it's clear it doesn't cost them that much when they offer an unlimited package for $12/month. Who are you to decide if they have a wildly profitable option that really only stupid people would use?


They do. They were notified. They were ignored.


I mean I'm not defending Bell or anything, as you're right, cellular service is expensive as fuck here. To be fair, I would be more than happy to continue paying what I pay for the level of service that we receive here. I travel a lot, and I've mentioned this many times, whenever I land back in Canada, I'm back to 2019 and mobile internet speeds are normal. Everywhere else I've traveled, either there's a ton of shitty spots, or massive congestion where you can barely load a web page.

We are spoiled here in Canada in terms of performance + reliability. Anywhere I am in the city, I can fire up a TV stream in perfect quality over mobile networks, at times even better than whatever place I'm at with their free wifi.

You're right but if your customers are humans, the business needs to be a bit humane from time to time.
If simply notifying in some manner that likely went to a spam folder meets the regulations, then that's a shame. Service should be cut off once a bill is 2x to 4x higher than normal and the onus is then back on the adult to contact Bell/Rogers/Telus and simply say "it's all good, switch me back on" or "holy crap - thanks for warning me". I don't know what extent the regulations demand on "notification".