Telus Screws Over Its EVDO Users By Cancelling Anyone Who Doesn’t Switch From An Unlimited Plan
I’m not sure why Canadian Telcos have decided to become so stupid (such as the iPhone price plans and charging for incoming text messages just to name two examples of their stupidity). But this qualifies as beyond dumb. It seems that Telus who sold a bunch of EVDO data cards for laptops with unlimited data plans have decided to cancel anyone who does NOT switch from a unlimited plan to a $65/month 1GB plan.
Clearly, when it comes to Telus EVDO users, the future is not friendly.
You can take a look at this thread at Howardforums, a discussion of the TELUS Terms Of Service (in red at the bottom), an EV-DO blogger who’s been a victim of this, as well as a post at Electronista to get an idea of the anger that has been generated over this.
The thing about this is that many people use these EVDO cards for high speed Internet access in rural Canada as people in rural Canada often have no other choice except dialup Internet. So this supremely screws them over.
Here’s how you fix this:
- If you have an EVDO card from Telus, complain to Telus.
- Force Telus to give you full refund for your EVDO card, cancel your service without penalty and then switch to Rogers or Bell. Granted, Rogers and Bell are pretty clueless too, but at least you’re not giving your money to bait and switch artists like Telus.
- File a class action lawsuit against Telus so that it teaches them that they can’t screw over their customers like this. If you need a good law firm, I’d recommend Merchant Law as they specialize in doing this sort of thing. Or join the class action lawsuit that is sure be filed shortly.
- Tell your friends about this and tell them not to do business with sleazebags like Telus.
Bottom line: Telus needs to back off of this stupid move or they will live to regret it.
March 12, 2009 at 2:47 pm
this cant be true ive been wit telus my whole life they never had screwed me over can u tell me more bout this
May 5, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Garrick, it has happened.
I was once a happy customer of Telus. A Blackberry ($500/mnth+ in usage) and an EVDO. The EVDO was under an unlimited plan. For over a year, I used the EVDO card for business and personal use without worry over overages and the likes.
Then suddenly, I received a voicemail from their customer service. Once I called back, they started saying “You have violated the ToS based on your usage of the device. You must either switch or cancel” They did offer to cancel at no penalty and take the device back which I promptly accepted.
Now, I warned a friend, he went thru the same experience as I did. He used his for a tenth of the workload I did. To me, its Telus playing a clear Bait’n Switch. Either they miscalculated the cost of EVDO service or they purposely did this to get users and try to convert them later. I tend to think the later.
The fun part is, I have now switched to Rogers who has a cap at 100$ if I go over and I have cancelled my phone with them. From this point forward, while I dislike Rogers and Bell, I will not utilize Telus’s services any longer. Their loss, a customer who was spending over 700$ in services with them now has gone to their competition.
What compounds this further, I managed a network group that has sites across Canada. Telus will be migrated away from soon for another provider. Woops, another $20k/mnth lost, darn. They seem not to have thought of the impact to their users and the effect in image.