mon petit blogue sans importance...

Vidéotron's and Bell's deceptive tactics and internet access ripoffs

It's funny how we hear about Vidéotron's Ultimate Speed 50 Mbps access, and now Bell's Fibe 25 Mbps access (i can't link directly to the service - click on Fibe 25) and we're told how great they are. They're actually both humongous ripoffs, if you have even basic math skills and 5 minutes ahead of you. Why? They both advertise those great speeds, but hidden behind those figures, in very small print, behind 2-3 clicks from the product pages, you'll find abysmal monthly transfer caps. This means that, yes you have a very fast connection. But if you were to use it fully, you'd very quickly fall into a lot of debt.

Vidéotron's transfer cap for their 50 Mbps service is at 100GB/month combined up/down – this means you will bust your cap within 5 *hours* if you were to fill your pipe. In turn, this means that you simply CANNOT reasonably use this service. Note that i'm taking all those numbers as being base-10. I.e., 5Mbps == 5e6 bits per second. 50GB == 50e9 bytes.

If you used your connection for 3 hours per day but wanted to stay within your cap (as overages are extremely expensive and UNLIMITED! there is no cap on the overage charges!), you’d have to stick to about 2 Mbps average speed.

80$/month for such a connection is starting to sound like quite a ripoff.

They offer an extra 30GB of transfer for 12.97$/month. You can get up to 3 such packages, but you have to get them in advance and keep them for at least 30 days – they won’t automatically add them if you went over the limit. Going over the limit costs $1.50/GB.

So, if we take the base service and add 3 30GB packages, we’re now at $117.50/month. Now it’ll take you ~8.5h to exceed your cap. If you were to use your service fully – at 50Mbps – for the whole month, you would get a bill for $24132.50. Granted, that’s a lot of data. But i just want to point out how ridiculous the terms of that offer are – it should not be legal.

It CANNOT and should not be advertised as a 50Mbps service.

See the product page for details and to check my math.

Bell's 25Mbps service has a - get this - 20GB transfer cap on it. They offer an extra 40GB for 5$/month. The base rate is $64.95/month (after 12 months). They also do not seem to cap the overage charges, though, unlike Vidéotron, they don't mention it on the website (they did mention the overage charges were capped back when they were, so i assume they're not anymore. The overage is charged at the whopping rate of $2.50/GB. So, if we take the base service + the extra 40GB, we'll get to that limit within about 5.3 hours. If you use your connection 3 hours a day, you shouldn't use more than 1.5Mbps if you don't want to pay the overage charges. And what if you were to use your connection full-tilt, full-time (which may well happen if you get infected with a trojan which then uses your computer as a spambot, sending emails as fast as it can and serving the spam executables to all other infected machines)? You'll get a bill for $8019.95. Better start saving up.

Check my math against the official information (click Fibe 25) if you want.

All i have is a 5Mbps connection from Teksavvy. But for $43.95 i have no transfer cap at all, a fixed IP, and immediate access to support techs who'll know what i'm talking about, and won't ask me if my computer is plugged-in when i tell them my modem won't sync with the DSLAM. But they can't offer more than 5Mbps.

I honestly don't understand how the media isn't picking up on Bell and Vidéotron's tactics, and how this can be legal. To be it's completely false advertising: they advertise great speeds (barely on par with the international market, though), which you can't reasonably use. All this needs is a lawsuit.

When will we get decent internet access in Canada???

Now, don't go and tell me that the only ones who would use such connections are pirates who illegally download movies. Firstly, there's more and more fully legal HD video online. A family using their 50Mbps connection to watch HD video a few hours a day would definitely run into their transfer cap. The other, more scary thing is all those computers infected with trojans. You have no idea what these will do. Some will sit there and send spam as fast as they can. That's why both Bell and Videotron block outgoing emails that bypasses their own email servers. But trojans can do lots of other things. One example is that once your computer is infected, the trojan will usually go and download another piece of software. Your computer might become a hub for serving those files, and you can very easily run into your transfer cap that way. Sure, it's in a way your fault for not having detected that your computer is infected. But many viruses and worms aren't detected by any software. It's very difficult to keep a windows machine uninfected.

If Bell and Vidéotron were the slightest bit honest about all this, they'd lock your connection to your cap, so that if you were to run into the transfer cap, your speed would drop - say, to 1Mbps. They'd also send you an email telling you about it. You'd have the choice to remove that lock, but by default it would be there. They could do smarter things, but this is easy, and works - i have to assume they're both dumb and malicious companies at this point, judging from their behavior.

Now, look at Wind Mobile. They does smart things with their Data Plans. They are unlimited transfer mobile data plans. But if their network is congested, they'll throttle the subscriber who have transferred over 5GB of data in the month. They won't bill them overage, they won't kill your connection, they'll just throttle it. If they have to. If you went over this soft limit. That's it. THAT'S HONEST. They're doing this because they don't want everyone from being negatively impacted by a tiny few who would hog the network. Bell and Vidéotron claim that their caps are for these reasons. If they truely were, they'd implement a simple policy like Wind Mobile's to make sure their network stays uncongested. But they don't. If you go over your quota and it's 3am and Vidéotron's local network is barely being used, and their outgoing pipe is just sitting there, they'll still charge you thousands of dollars.

That is complete bullshit.

by wiswaud on 17 February 2010
Tags: english, geeky, screwtheman

Comments

François 17 February 2010 16:22 EST

That's funny, as I read all that, in my head that was Rick Mercer doing his famous Rant.

Perhaps someone should send him the URL ;) Too bad HE doesn't have to suffer Videotron or Bell.

Erik Kretschmer 17 February 2010 17:13 EST

Here in Germany, as far as I know, all high speed Internet access have so-called "flatrates", which basically means they are unlimited in access time and bandwidth. KabelBW, my provider, offers 10, 25, 50 and 100 Mbps ranging from 20 to 50 Euro/m. But these include all telephone as well and in the case of the highest rates, digital and HD TV as well as multiple phone lines.

Other provider, mainly DSL, also offer these flatrates. Its not all perfect though... some throttle the connection speed after a certain cap (might depend on the service, but I heard around 200 GB with Deutsche Telekom DSL). Nevertheless, they will never charge extra for bandwidth, which is fair. What I find a bit more shady is the lack of open information on the bandwidth throttle cap. Nothing is perfect in this world.

Alexandre Patry 17 February 2010 19:11 EST

While I agree with most of what you've written in this blog, I'd like to play devil's advocate a bit.

I don't agree with comments such as "If you used your connection for 3 hours per day [...] you’d have to stick to about 2 Mbps average speed."

The thing is, people don't use their connections for X hours; people use their connections to download X bytes. People use their connections in bursts. They'll go on youtube and watch a few videos; then they'll browse the web, etc... the 25Mbps (or other fast speeds) are rarely fully used. I can easily play those 720p videos on youtube with my 6mbps connection so having a 25mbps connection doesn't make me download any more. There are not many ways in which someone can fully use the bandwidth, other than downloading movies (probably illegal) or other large files. Sure there's more and more youtube hd and stuff, but the fact is that these don't get anywhere close to your bandwidth limit, and you can't watch the movies any faster than they're displayed. The fact is, in Canada, I couldn't find any hd streaming of movies like there is in the USA, for example Netflix. Honestly, I have a hard time figuring out how someone can consistently download 100+ gigs per month if not downloading anything illegal such as 1080p movies and Xbox360 ISOs. I'm sure there are ways and some people have legitimate ways of doing so, but these apply to maybe 0.1% of the population... there's only so many linux distros and crappy youtube videos you can download!

What I like about faster internet services is the availability of speed. In any given month I'll probably download apprx 80-120Gb, and that's without holding back. I like the idea that if I need it, I can get it FAST. I can get that 1080p movie in an hour instead of 4h, meaning if my significant other tells me during dinner "it'd be nice to watch movie X tonight", I can deliver. With my 6mbps connection, I can't: it won't be ready before 10 or 11pm.

With Bell you can get their 40Gb insurance package up to 3 times, so that's an extra 120Gb for 15$. In Ontario, our cap is 75Gb. So for me, that'll be 195Gb / month, for an extra 15$. I can live with that, given that I'll have exceptional speeds, upstream and downstream. I should be able to keep it below 195Gb.....

Now with all that being said, a 20Gb cap (in Quebec) is atrocious and a total joke. But keep in mind the overuse charge is capped at 30$ per month, and I think that's acceptable. However, uncapped overuse charges like your Videotron example are criminal IMHO..

And throttling torrents to 30 kb/s is also equally unacceptable. If it was dynamically dependent on network congestion, it would make more sense, but to say "you can only use 1/20 (or less) of your purchased speed during the hours where you're most likely to use it" is total crap.

wiswaud 17 February 2010 21:22 EST

Alexandre: Bell's overage charges used to be capped, and it said so explicitly on the web. It doesn't anymore - at least, for Fibe 25 it doesn't -, and i have to assume that that means the charges are NOT capped anymore. I read the fine print again, and i don't see anywhere that you can buy the "insurance" three times (but it doesn't say you can only buy it once either).
I did notice something funny, though: if you subscribe to Fibe 25 and you're *already a Bell Sympatico + 1 other service customer*, your cap is *90 GB*. So very weird.

And i respectfully disagree about having to be doing illegal downloads to go over 100GB. You can right now watch lots of 1080p video on Vimeo. You can watch lots of 720p video on Youtube. Watch this gorgeous movie for example: http://vimeo.com/9431503 . It clocks in at ~2Mbps. I can't watch 3 hours a day of that with their current cap. Would i? No, not now. But more and more people are ditching their TV and watching shows online, legally. But without good, uncapped internet service, canadians will be left behind, if we're not already.

I'm also simply calling bullsh*t on their tactics. If they were honest, they'd implement real throttling on the worst offenders, dynamically when their network is suffering. But they're not - they have a fee structure meant to kick those people out completely. But these people are merely ahead of the curve - by doing this, bell and vidéotron are just making sure *THEY*'ll be left behind soon...

Alexandre Patry 18 February 2010 21:48 EST

Salut Éric,

here's the details from my Fibe25 ordering (sent by Bell via email)

Service: Bell Internet FibeMC 25

Promotion: Tarif courant de base

Début de l'offre: 24 février 2010

Tarif mensuel actuel (tarif sous réserve de changements): 74,90 $ incluant les frais pour le modem de 6,95 $/mois (moins tous les rabais du Forfait applicables (10$))

Vitesses allant jusqu'à: 25 Mbps

Capacité d'utilisation mensuelle
(en amont et en aval): 75 Go

Frais d'utilisation excédentaire (tarif sous réserve de changements): 1,00 $/Go pour un maximum de 30 $ par mois

They also have, in small print: "Bell peut exiger des frais d'utilisation excédentaire à l'occasion."

Hehehe..... wonder in what situation they would do that... and I don't especially like the fact that they could change their rates.

About the 5$ insurance packages, it's true that they don't mention it online, and that you can only add it to cart once, but you can indeed get it up to three times. I first saw it on redflagdeals.com forum threads, and confirmed it with the agent when I ordered the service via phone.

The other side of the medal is that the reason why these companies exist is to make money for their shareholders... Bell, Rogers, Videotron, etc. are in the market of being profitable. Sure they could offer uncapped internet and no throttling and cheaper prices etc. but there's nobody pushing them (i.e. competition isn't better) so why would they? And it's not in their advantage to offer unlimited bandwidth so that people can ditch their TV service, because all these companies happen to sell TV services! They won't make it THAT easy for people to ditch them...

So there needs to be a fair balance... I don't think 75Gb is fair, nor is 30 kb/s throttling for half of the day. But, I don't think that expecting everything under the sun for 57.95$ / month is fair to them either. These companies don't owe us anything, really. We can complain and all but in the end, if we're unhappy, we can go somewhere else. Teksavvy and others can't provide equally fast speeds so they compensate with no caps. Basically, companies like Bell and Videotron only need to be slightly better than the competition... they don't need to blow them away, and let's be honest, Videotron with their unlimited overcharges aren't any better (unless you like 1000$ / month charges), and here in Ontario, Rogers with their 50$ max overcharge isn't better either... Sure, as a customer, I'd love unlimited everything! But it is what it is and I can somewhat understand "their" side. If Teksavvy become able to provide high speeds and no caps, then the giants will probably react to keep their lead.

Until Fibe25 is installed in my house, I am still running my grand-fathered Bell unlimited internet, at 6mbps with no cap.. but I prefer paying a few more bucks (13$ in my case) and get 4-5x more download speed, and 10x more upload speed (which is gonna be great for times when I work from home) with a 195Gb cap. Nobody forced me... but I appreciate Bell's offering!

In closing, I think that, the mentality that heavy downloaders like me (and probably you too!) is to budget the extra 30$ in the cost and consider it unlimited. So it's 87.95$ (57.95$ + 30$) and you have unlimited. Thinking that way, we don't feel like we're getting screwed that much! You pay for your 99th percentile heavy usage and that's a fair price. If you're with Videotron and want no cap, they're a bad fit for you! And if you're like the VAST majority of people that never hits 50Gb in a month (IMHO, I couldn't find accurate data online but I'd venture that 75% of all users don't even reach 25Gb), then you pay 57.95$ and are happy, or, just get Fibe12 and get pretty decent speeds for 36,95$ per month!

It could be worst.... I was reading a bit online and Comcast (in the USA) limits you to 250Gb, and will SUSPEND YOUR ACCOUNT for a year if you exceed it twice...

wiswaud 19 February 2010 08:20 EST

Alex: thanks, that's great - i wish they'd advertise this. I have to say it's a perfectly ok deal, then, as long as this $30 limit is effective.
I don't download that much, but i just wouldn't want to be left open to the possibility of getting a $1k bill if i had left a torrent accidentally open for 2 weeks with no up limit...
Now, maybe Vidéotron *also* limit their over charges??? They explicitly say the opposite on their website, so i don't think that's the case. So this post should perhaps be dedicated to just them, then :)

merci!

wiswaud 26 February 2010 09:17 EST

This post was mentionned here: http://stopthecap.com/2010/02/25/cana...

Andrea 26 February 2010 16:05 EST

Salut Éric,
I won't comment on the Internet access we get here in Sweden, 'cause I know you would get depressed if I told you that I get 100 Mbps uncapped plus internet telephone no subscription fee and free calls to any subscriber using the same ISP, which happens to be half of Sweden population, for about 45$ CAD/month.
I won't mention that.
Instead I want to thank you for linking to the beautiful "The Sandpit" movie. Great stuff!

ciao
/A

DidiM 3 April 2010 15:37 EDT

I'm glad to have found this page. I have been going through hell with Videotron for the last 6 months. I was overcharged and for 6 months I must have spoken to at least 60 different customer service reps who ALL promised they would call me back and who ALL said I would be credited what was owed me etc.... I NEVER got ANY call backs and I was calling as often as 5 days a week trying to get some feedback. It got to the point where I had NO idea what I was even supposed to be paying a month. I even ended up writing the President of Videotron trying to get someone to call me back!!
The long and short of this is: Yesterday I had a supervisor call me back - who told me the ONLY way I was going to be credited the monies owed me was to agree to a new 2 year contract - with penalties of $400.00 if I cancel in the first year etc...
When I asked for a written copy of the verbal agreement he was making with me; he REFUSED. And that is what started all the mess in the first place!!
So - the result is; any agent at Videotron can tell you ANYTHING - but - if they don't honor the verbal agreement they made with you - YOU ARE SCREWED!! They treated me like a freaking criminal - when my record with them has been - almost 20 years of being a customer and I was never - ever late on a bill.
This I know is going against all consumer laws and yet they are getting away with it. I am of course, not going to let this go and will be contacting - the CRTC - etc... but first want to hear from another agent on Tuesday or Wednesday - what my file reads as far as my balance is concerned.
Like I said it's been a nightmare - I even ended up in collections and had my line disconnected - all this again for money I DID NOT OWE - they owed me almost $300.00 for overcharges which at least 5 agents and 2 supervisors agreed to.
And yet - the supervisor who call me yesterday - said - well - that's too bad. Take my offer or leave it!! He let me know - that no matter what is promised - Videotron can change its mind and charge you whatever the hell they please.
I'm repeating this - because it is so stunning and I'm still in shock over the brutal way they've treated such a longstanding excellent customer - because I was asking them to honor the multiple promises they made to me and then immediately broke, over and over and over again!!!
And to think, then they also have the power to wreck your credit standing - if some clerk decides they don't like you... and the list goes on.

I'd like to connect with other people who have fallen victim to this - no written agreement policy - either with videotron and/or bell. I will be blogging about this of course - but I also want to get others who have been through something like this, because I do know a number of people in the media who will hopefully give this outrage the time in the news it needs.
The public needs to know - that without a written agreement - Videotron can do what it likes... and say what it likes. And yet ALL our telecommunication companies - refuse to put ANYTHING in writing for its customers.
Please email me if you'd like to look at this further and of course I appreciate any feedback you may have
DidiM

wiswaud 6 April 2010 11:01 EDT

DidiM - i've actually had a similar experience years ago. I had a digital receiver, and i moved temporarily into another apartment, where i didn't get the digital cable. I called Vidéotron and told them i wouldn't take digital service for 2 months, until i moved to a new place. They said everything was fine, i could keep the receiver for that time.
When i moved to the new place, they came to install the service. A few weeks later i get a call from a collections agency: Vidéotron hired them to get $800 back from me, for stealing the digital receiver box - the same one i'm still using. They never called me, it went straight to collections. It took me quite a few angry calls with them to straighten everything out, but like in your case their assumption whenever i spoke to them was that i did in fact steal it...

Videotron-R-Mobster 12 May 2010 22:51 EDT

I just wanted to add to the complaints made about Videotron..... They are EXTORTIONIST!!!!!

They charged me 7.95 per gigabyte... When I went over My usage. My usage was 8 Gb over .... The charge 64.00 dollars!!!!! WTF!!!!! It's only 12.50 to add an extra 30 Gb. Videotron would not add the 12.50 for the previous Month to compensate for the extra Gb I used... This is Highway Robbery and of course the Customer Service is less than desirable and they discriminate against Anglophones !!!

So I encourage all of you , you have had Service with Videotron and got RIPED OFF to file la complaint with the CRTC if enough of us complain we will finally get somewhere with these Crooks and also try your local MP
Or the Minister of Industry Canada Tony Clement.

Best of luck