[redbean]

I'm going on an extended trip for 4 months, and I wanted to put my shaw phone on hold while I was away. I called tech support, but they weren't sure if there would be a charge or not (argh, so annoying). Does anyone here know if I can suspend my shaw phone for free, and then, get the same phone number when I get back????

Thanks so much!!!!

 

[Scadam]

We had a major fire in our building last year and one of the things I did was call Shaw to suspend our services (TV, phone, net) temporarily until we got the insurance, restoration, etc... figured out. I had two reasons - not wanting to pay when it's not in use, and also because I was on a sweet set of promotions and didn't want to waste a month+ of the low price.

Shaw assured me they could suspend those promotions so no time was wasted, and I didn't think to inquire about the phone number. Turns out someone at shaw made a mistake and disconnected everything the wrong way, or did something in the wrong order.

When we got into our temporary rental (after a month of staying with friends), I called Shaw to get everything set up. We were lucky and recovered a lot of our stuff, including all electronics.

First problem - absolute confusion regarding the promotions. Spent a long while on the phone getting it sorted out and since nothing was suspended properly they pretty much had to re-apply all the promotions, which of course no longer existed, and fun was had by all.

Fast forward a few weeks and the phone no longer receives calls. Contact Shaw and apparently it was to do with how they accidentally disconected it in the wrong order and that number has now reverted back to Telus. At this point there was no way for Shaw to recover my number.

Shaw walked me through the steps to get my number back, but it was still a hassle. I had to call Telus and sign up for basic phone service, in order to reactivate that number. Then call Shaw back and have them take the number again, with a delay of a week I think without a phone?

Then when the Telus bill arrived I'd been assured that Shaw would repay me for the exact amount (hookup fee, partial month) by simply calling them with the exact amount. Called Shaw and of course reading them the amount wasn't good enough even though it was about what they'd told me to expect, and whoever I'd talked to at Shaw hadn't made notes of that (or the escalating series of frustrations). So as a finale I got to make a trip to Shaw in person, stand in line, go through the spiel for the umteenth time and tada I was reimbursed and had a working phone!

Off topic - the promotions ended up being a nightmare too. Shaw overbilled me the first month and I got to chat on the phone and go over it all again to get it sorted out and told me to not pay anything at all - not a bad deal. Then the next month they got it wrong again. Called them again and once more they supposedly fixed it and told me what to expect on my next bill. Surprise, next bill still screwed up... All in all I ended up getting free Shaw services for three months in exchange for a lot of telephone time and frustration. A fair trade in my opinion, seeing as how my budget is in worse shape than my mental health! To this day I still don't know if my promotions will continue to work, some of what the last girl had to do to 'fix' the free pvr for example was put in a limited time promotion because the long duration promotion I'd received no longer exists. Then I'm supposed to just remind them to extend it I think was how she worded it... I have no idea what happens with the 'free rental' cable box in my daughter's room that had no time limit. Fingers crossed for when the first set of promotions expire next month.

So yeah, don't 'suspend' anything unless you feel brave. If I was you I'd remove any calling features or long distance plans and bring it down to the base 15 a month and just leave it alone...

 

[Shaw Champ]

Hi there, Shaw offers the ability to suspend any of it's services for a minimum of 1 month to a maximum of 6 months once per calender year.

Some consideration points:

• Shaw needs a minimum of a 10 day notice in order to organize this.
• Your phone number is kept safe - if you suspend your phone and do not have Voice Mail incoming callers will receive a "this number has been disconnected" message. Upon return to normal service the phone will come back just as before. If you subscribe to Voice Mail and want to keep it active (see below) Shaw also offers Voice Mail to Email free.
• On the date of re-connection - services will be restored some-point during the day - we can not give a specific time but we do say it would be during our normal install window of 8am-8pm (some regional differences)
• There could be a re-connection fee depending on what services you have.
  • If you have all 3 services the re-connection fee is FREE if you place just 1 or all services on suspension
  • If you have 2 services re-connection fee is $14.95
  • If you have 1 service re-connection fee is $29.95
  • These re-connection fee's mirror our regular installation fees as truck roll is often required twice - once to turn off and again back on again actually at a higher cost to Shaw. Consider that it is still less expensive then the monthly rate you would pay and a re-connection fee is a one time fee applied upon resuming service.
• Other potential fee's and options:
  • If a customer has a Shaw email address and wants to keep it active (ability to check through Shaw Website off the Shaw Website anytime) $1.95/month fee for duration of absence.
  • If a customer has Voice Mail and wants to keep it active $9.95/month fee for duration of absence. (edit - correcting price)
• Customers have the option of downgrading some services to their base level prior to suspension.
• If TV is being left on and people are in your home we can assist with putting "purchase & locks pins" on your service to stop any potential abuse of VOD or PPV ordering for peace of mind. Your account can also have a verbal password applied to it as well we should have another form of ID on file to stop people calling up to order over the phone in these two areas.
• We have a ton of "snowbirds" who do this every fall when they take a vacation south to warmer weather
• If you have a specific promotion on your account and chose to take advantage of a Shaw suspension of services you would loose your promotional rate upon return. EG you have a 6 month offer and 4 months in you go away. You suspend your services, upon return your services would come back on billing at regular rates. You cannot say have a 6 month offer, in month 4 suspend services for 3 months and when you come back expect the final 2 months rate of your offer. We count any time away inclusive of any promotional period (even if you are not charged) Customers have to chose what would work best for them and agents can work out the financial differences for the period for the customer. Shaw will consider all options including downgrading services - which ever works out best for you and present that choice.
• Internally we call this service a TCIS - Which stands for Temporary Change In Service.
  

 

[shawguy]

Thank you Shaw Champ. This is very useful information