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Bell doubles max charge for DSL overage.

6196 Views 20 Replies 11 Participants Last post by  Larry
Hearing colleagues have received email informing them that the max overage is going from $30 to $60, effective Jan 2011.

OMG @ Bell's inaptly named "Performance" Internet plan:

Ontario - 25GB of usage per month; $2.00/additional GB, (max. $60/mo.),
Québec - 60GB of usage per month; $2.50/additional GB, (max. $60/mo.)

Nice that Bell waited for the UBB green-light before sticking in the latest knife.
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Videotron charges $4.50 / GB when you go over (thats more than 2x what Bell charges) up to a max of $50.

Bell Charges $5/month for an extra 40GB - a reasonable charge.

I don't mind paying for what I use. I get value from Netflix - so I pay Netflix. Why shouldn't Bell (or any other ISP) get their fair share too?
I don't really have too much sympathy for you. If you were ok with paying $30 extra each month, you must have been downloading a lot. For $30 you could get an additional 240 GB.

Many other services do not have a $ cap - like mobile roaming charges. Not sure why you feel Bell owes you a low cap like $30.
What other countries do or do not do, have no bearing on what happens in Canada. Other countries may not have socialized medicine. Others have no workers rights or freedoms.

If other ISPs have higher caps or sell bandwidth a lower cost, who is stopping anyone from choosing those ISPs. No one is forcing you to choose Bell. It is not a monopoly. It is all about what the market will bear. Videotron, Rogers are no different.

I don't understand why this practice is anti-competitive. Should Bell allow us all to download whatever for some fixed cost, and allow all the over-the-top players like Netflix get a free ride and reap all the benefits of the infrastructure put in place by Bell and others?

Unless the network infrastructure players make money, there won't be an infrastructure for anyone to use. With more and more high bandwidth services emerging, without restrictions Bell will need to invest more and more in the infrastructure to provide service. Without increased revenue, how do you expect Bell to pay for that?

If everyone would pay their fair share (and that means those using more, pay more), the costs would remain reasonable and low. I am not interested in having my rates go up, because some choose to download torrents all day long.

If you think that the networks have infinite capacity and require no investment as traffic grows, I am sorry to tell you that is not the case.
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If they changed the terms of your contract, you have grounds to ask for a "grandfather" clause. I agree they don't have a right to change the terms of your contract after you signed. They try often to do that, but they shouldn't be allowed - after all, you aren't. I would demand they honour the terms of your contract - cap of $30. Keep asking for a supervisor until you get to someone who will do that for you.
You really can't be implying that my health care or workplace rights has anything to with being ripped off by Bell are you? In case you are, FYI - Bell is a private for profit corporation. Yes, their market may be heavily regulated by their buddies over at the CRTC but the profits do go to the shareholders. Not into health care and not into workers rights.
I was trying to point out that the assertion that other countries don't have download caps, has nothing to do with Canada - that's it. Not relevant.
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