EXCLUSIVE: A Conversation With Iristel VP Maged Bishara
Since the story netTALK versus Iristel began for me on Sunday night, I’ve been looking to get to the truth. Or at least as much of that as I could. To that end, I was very fortunate to get in touch with Maged Bishara who is the Vice President of Operations at Iristel to get his side of this story as this is a story that has a whole lot of moving parts to it.
The first thing that Mr. Bishara wanted to express to me is that he completely understands the anger that is out there. He gets that he’s affected the lives of 75,000 Canadians by disconnecting them from netTALK and he understands why people are upset. But he was left with little choice as he’s owed $2,000,000 by netTALK and he cannot provide a service under those conditions. He also points out that this started two years ago, and that netTALK has done this before. The former point matches the information that I have researched and I have found evidence of the latter point. He also disputes netTALK’s claim that they tried to work with him to port the numbers over before the deadline that he had set with netTALK. Bishara contends that if they did want to port the numbers across to another provider before their deadline, he would have done it.
Mr. Bishara also mentioned that he is working closely with the CRTC to resolve this (it’s also worth noting that according to him that netTALK is not at the table with the CRTC and Iristel). The reason for him going this route to resolve this issue is that he is not allowed to speak to netTALK customers directly as Iristel are acting as a CLEC for netTALk. CLEC stands for competitive local exchange carrier. The non-nerd explanation is that they interface Canadian numbers with the netTALK service. If you want a more nerdy answer, check out this Wikipedia article. Because of this he has to get assistance from the CRTC to make this happen. When they get direction from the CRTC, they will allow the numbers to be ported to any carrier that the customer desires. In other words, netTALK customer’s phone numbers are safe and will be able to be moved to another provider. However, to nobody’s surprise netTALK will not be one of those carriers. Bishara recommends that consumers choose their carrier carefully to avoid this situation. What’s the timeline for this? It could happen at anytime and when it does, I will get something online to let you know.
I want to thank Mr. Bishara for taking the time to speak to me, and also I would like to thank Bob Brehl for setting this up. My next task is to write a story on netTALK’s side of the story. I will have that online later today.
January 19, 2016 at 5:20 pm
Well, as an affected NetTALK customer, I can assure you that there is a white lie when Mr Bishara states that he is not allowed to speak to netTALK customers directly as Iristel are acting as a CLEC for netTALk. I have proof of an e-mail received earlier today, at exactly 11:46 AM EST, of a whining Razvan Manic, Customer Care Manager at Iristel Canada (I’ve posted the whole conversation on NetTALK’s forum) because Iristel sounds like a broken record with pointing fingers and this morning’s threatening TWEET from Iristel against NetTALK, which you posted earlier today.
First of all, Iristel will have a lot to answer for…and is just as guilty as NetTALK… An example: how come Iristel Canada has leased “DID” numbers to a US Company (NT) for more than 2 years, all the while Iristel’s Board members had a few years experience (hinting at the former NT’s President that sat simultaneously as the CEO of Iristel, who’s now the president of Iristel) knowing with certainty that NetTALK was a non-compliant provider in Canada according to the CRTC.
If anyone has access to Bloomberg, they will find information about these 2 companies as well as Telestrata and unveil the names of the CFO, the CEO and other board members have always worked together, just switching chairs and titles since 2008. They must have personality disorders as they succeeded to cause mayhem every other year (2010, 2012, 2014). They’ve succeeded in causing major discomfort and inducing a high level of stress to their customers every — single — time.
January 19, 2016 at 7:34 pm
I find it ironic that Mr Bishara is not permitted to speak to Canadians but he is permitted to curtail the service that we depend on. I do not owe him any money, how is he allowed to use me as a hostage in his dispute with nettalk. That’s what courts are for.
Why is there no threat of a class action suit?