Yak has filed two applications with the CRTC to “protect Canadians against consumer gouging.”
The applications are in response to a new trend among ILEC telephone companies to add network access fees for phone lines that aren’t signed up to monthly calling plans. Most of the telephone company long distance plans have minimum monthly fees as well.
In a press release titled Yak calls recent TELUS fee illegal; Calls on CRTC to remove it, Yak VP Andrew Boone was quoted:
Our phones have been ringing off the hook with customers who are angry and confused about this new fee. They have every right to be angry – this fee is completely unfair to customers, which is why we have taken it to the CRTC to have it removed.
PIAC and the Consumers Association of Canada are supporting Yak’s application.
In one of the applications, Yak asks the CRTC to declare TELUS’ Long Distance Network Access Charge to be “an illegal local rate increase” and asks for remedies including refunds to all consumers that have paid the fees, compensation to competing long distance providers for the harm caused by the new fee and an apology to be inserted into all customer bills.
TELUS introduced the charge on November 1 for all customers who do not subscribe to a long distance service plan. Customers were told
The charge will be used to maintain our capability to provide reliable, high quality Long Distance service to all clients at all times, through infrastructure investment in Long Distance facilities, management of telephone carrier relationships and ongoing operational and business development expenses for Long Distance service.
PIAC was cited in a recent newspaper article complaining about the fee. At the time, a TELUS spokesperson said “From time to time companies need to increase costs for providing services and this is what this is.” Keep in mind, this fee is for people who don’t subscribe to a long distance plan!
Yak’s other application seeks to have the CRTC revisit a decision from earlier this year in which the CRTC removed most constraints that apply to basic toll schedules. At the time of that decision, this blog post commented somewhat presciently that the CRTC missed an opportunity to shut down across the board network access fees.
Yak and Telehop, among some other companies, do not charge monthly fees for their dial-around or pre-subscribed long distance services.