CityWest Marketing Manager Chad Cunningham told Prince Rupert City Council Monday evening the company has decided to enforce limits on internet plans because the company has faced increasing costs for bandwidth it can no longer afford to absorb.
I’m gonna have to go ahead and call bullshit. Unless of course by increased cost of bandwidth they mean decreased revenue from cable tv. The cost of wholesale bandwidth is going down their prices are going up and somehow it costs more? Bullshit.
“Our top person used seven or eight hundred gigabytes in a month. To service that person cost us over $1,000. I wouldn’t know what they are doing, but we have to have a mechanism to charge certain people that are using the resource so much that it’s costing us more”
Bullshit.
Citywest doesn’t pay by the byte. If I transfer 100 GB, or if I transfer 1 GB, the cost to Citywest is the same.
“The rise in usage has led to a $6.15 increase in our costs for bandwidth per customer per month. During this same period we’ve not raised rates, we’ve absorbed this cost.”
Or, roughly, their costs have increased about a dollar per customer per year. Roughly. They haven’t increased their prices to deal with increasing costs of labour, of electricity and gas, and all their other expenses. Not to mention the costs of their expansion. That’s what’s going on here. This is a normal increase in their non-bandwidth costs, not in the cost of their bandwidth.
Again, don’t believe them when they say that a person costs them $1,000 in bandwidth. They don’t. Citywest doesn’t pay for bandwidth, but they want YOU to pay for it. Citywest pays for the connection, not how much data goes through it.
Same old, same old from the local crew, however, there is hope at least for Netflix users.
Seems they are fighting back against the telco gangsters,
theglobeandmail.com/news/tec … le1961342/
Be interesting to see what the telco, that also doubles as a cable provider does to change that dynamic.
I think its good that people pay for what they use. If someone actually used $1000 dollars worth of bandwidth, I don’t want to foot the bill, sorry!
Next thing you know, they’ll charge phone use by the minute! Oh my! Then those that use up their minutes will be charged more. Oh wait! that is how it works. Same as for everything else power, gas, water. Don’t like it because you don’t have a choice…well you don’t have a choice with BC Hydro or PNG either. Welcome to life in Northern BC, it costs more for everything.
Citywest doesn’t pay by the byte. Doesn’t matter how much you download, it costs the same to Citywest.
Look at it from this point of view: what if you had to pay, by the minute, for every phone call you RECEIVED at home? It doesn’t cost Citywest anything if you talk on your phone for 5 minutes, or if you talk on your phone for 50 minutes. But what if they decided that they were losing money in their phone division, and therefore would need to start charging people more if they who talk too much?
Or what if you were watching TV for only 1 hour a week, and somebody else watches 14 hours per week? Which one costs Citywest more money?
Residential water is another example of an unmetered service. Should you pay $2.00/litre more if you use more water than your “cap” ?
That’s what’s happening here. They’re losing money, and they see a way to make a killing.
Where does the $2.00/GB figure come from? Anybody know?
Again, so you understand, Citywest does not pay by the amount of data you transfer. They pay for the connection, not the amount of data. There is nobody costing Citywest $1000. That’s hyperbole to scare people, and apparently it’s working.
Also, we’ve gone from “just a few people” to 7% of its customers.
As has been pointed out already, Citywest doesn’t pay by the GB. So it’s not an issue of people “paying for what they use.” Here’s what Chad Cunningham said about that: “We don’t pay for each GB transferred. And have not made that claim.”
Water isn’t metered, is it? If you take 10 showers a day, you pay the same as someone who takes one shower a week.
PNG and BC Hydro are both monopolies that are regulated. If that’s your comparison, then yeah, let’s regulate Citywest. Let them open up their books and prove to a regulatory body that they need to start charging $2.00/GB, even though they don’t pay per GB.
PNG recently asked for a 10% hike on your gas bill. Did they get it?
It’s the maximum allowed by the CRTC.
I have to agree that what Citywest is facing is rising costs for a whole bunch of reasons, and it wants heavy internet users to pay for some of those costs.
But ultimately, this is another reason that the City should not own Citywest.
I really wonder how the “fiscal conservatives” and the right-wingers can justify the City of Prince Rupert owning a corporation that is actively competing with private enterprise in Terrace and Kitimat, (and in Prince Rupert with cable & cellular), while at the same time the City keeps raising taxes.
From Michael Geist’s blog: michaelgeist.ca/content/view/5711/125/
“The cable company submission to the CRTC on usage based billing confirms what has been readily apparent to consumers for some time: there is no link between the prices charged by ISPs for usage pricing and the actual costs to ISPs.”
"In order to be effective as an economic ITMP, the usage based price component needs to be established so as to discourage use above the set limit. The price should incent use in excess of the limit only to the extent that the consumer would gain significant value from that usage. If the price is set substantially below the consumer’s value, it will have little influence on usage. It follows that the price does not necessarily reflect the cost of supplying the network capacity.
In other words, UBB is behaviour based billing, not usage based billing. Notwithstanding the claims about fairness, paying what you use, or costs to the network, overage pricing is not connected to cost or even value - it is designed to price above the real value to stop Canadians from “overusing” the Internet. "
Short version: Using the internet to watch Netflix or iTunes isn’t good for our cable business! So we need to charge you extra money to make you stop.
OK,
so if its such a money grab, why is it that he says some light users will pay less and most will pay the same amount as they do now? If its only 7% of the users going over the limit how are they going to make such a bundle of cash? Please explain.
?
If indeed they are trying to force people away from internet movies and tv content then:
As dividends go back to the city, would you not say that those that do not subscribe to cable and instead skirt it by using netflix etc, are in fact skirting (in a very indirect way) city coffers or city taxes therefore increasing the tax burden on everyone else? If this is the case, I still support the usage based model. Sounds like for once Citywest management is making a wise choice for its shareholders (ie the city, ie taxpayers) and people are still complaining.
By charging that 7% of users $100 or $200 per month! $2/GB, remember.
It’s also, like the posts above explain, a way of discouraging people from using the internet to replace cable, by subscribing to netflix or watching movies and TV on iTunes, or streaming Global TV off their website, etc.
If 7% of users talk on their home phones more than the rest of us, should they have to pay extra too?
Or what if 7% of Rupert residents watch TV more than average, should they be forced to pay extra as well?
If you use 75gigs per month, or if you use 175gigs per month, the cost to Citywest is the same. But they will charge one person $35.00, and the other person $235.00 . That’s just insane.
[quote=“Beanaround”]If indeed they are trying to force people away from internet movies and tv content then:
As dividends go back to the city, would you not say that those that do not subscribe to cable and instead skirt it by using netflix etc, are in fact skirting (in a very indirect way) city coffers or city taxes therefore increasing the tax burden on everyone else?[/quote]
So we should charge people a tax for having a satellite dish? Or not having cable at all? What the heck are you smoking?
Next you’ll be telling us that people who use a home phone instead of a cellphone (because it’s cheaper) will have to pay extra too, since they’re “in fact skirting (in a very indirect way) city coffers or city taxes therefore increasing the tax burden on everyone else.”
I say you should volunteer to “help the city coffers” by paying $2.00/minute when you use your home phone “more than average” since you’re robbing Citywest of revenue.
And they should double the business tax on video rental stores as well.
This is why government shouldn’t be in business.
Maybe you can explain to us what effect Citywest buying a cable company had on city coffers? What effect did Citywest “writing off” their cellular network has had on city coffers? Or what effect did Citywest running a fiber line to Kitimat and buying a building there had on city coffers?
I’d say a much greater effect than someone watching netflix.
[quote=“MiG”]
Water isn’t metered, is it? If you take 10 showers a day, you pay the same as someone who takes one shower a week.
PNG recently asked for a 10% hike on your gas bill. Did they get it? [/quote]
Water is metered in a lot of municipalities and yes they are looking at charging more for heavy users (like industrial/commercial) vs private homeowners in the future in PR. So not quite metered but definitely tiered.
As for PNG, don’t forget BC Hydro has asked for 10% a year for the next 4 years or so.
Both electricity and gas are things that have a cost per unit used. So does water, if it is metered. In those cases, you have a place to complain, and a board or elected official that sets the price. Citywest has none of those.
Again, there is no difference in cost to Citywest if you use 1GB of data, or if you use 200GB of data. They don’t pay by the GB, as Mr. Cunningham has confirmed. Yet they want to charge $2.00 per GB.
Like others have said, city west is a monopoly,plain and simple, Netflix, apple tv, and soon to be google tv are the competion, citywest does not want you to use the Internet to watch tv or movies they want you to pay for that with their cable subscription, if it was not for the wife I would get rid of cable tv but she loves to watch Ellen something I have not been able to do with boxee box.
[quote=“sandimas”]So we should charge people a tax for having a satellite dish? Or not having cable at all? What the heck are you smoking?
Next you’ll be telling us that people who use a home phone instead of a cellphone (because it’s cheaper) will have to pay extra too, since they’re “in fact skirting (in a very indirect way) city coffers or city taxes therefore increasing the tax burden on everyone else.”
I say you should volunteer to “help the city coffers” by paying $2.00/minute when you use your home phone “more than average” since you’re robbing Citywest of revenue.
And they should double the business tax on video rental stores as well.
This is why government shouldn’t be in business.
I’d say a much greater effect than someone watching netflix.[/quote]
Satellite and cable are pretty much on a level playing field for price, I personally prefer the better service and reception of Citywest, I don’t see your argument. Unless you are referring to pirating US signals illegally then that’s a moral issue I guess.
If I do go over my minutes on my plan (cellphone, land phone - it doesn’t matter), I do pay more, if I do not like it, I change to a and pay for a plan with more minutes. Not sure what you are getting at there?
Video rental stores in town pay their taxes and business licences etc. so they already contribute and pass that cost on.
So yes, all these do contribute. Netflix does not.
[quote=“MiG”]Both electricity and gas are things that have a cost per unit used. So does water, if it is metered. In those cases, you have a place to complain, and a board or elected official that sets the price. Citywest has none of those.
Again, there is no difference in cost to Citywest if you use 1GB of data, or if you use 200GB of data. They don’t pay by the GB, as Mr. Cunningham has confirmed. Yet they want to charge $2.00 per GB.[/quote]
Right. and those that don’t use as much will pay less. Same size of pie, but those that eat more of it will pay more and those that eat less will pay less.
So you’ll be happy to pay for Cable TV by the hour? Or pay for local phone calls on your home phone by the minute, right?
You’re the ideal customer for a government-run company!
I wonder if a Pizza place or taxi company pay the same amount for a business line as a funeral home? Will this be the next business strategy?
What did Citywest do with business phone line rates when they faced the exact same situation they now face with internet use? Did they penalize businesses who use “more than average” and start charging them by the minute on incoming calls when they went “over the cap” ? I seem to remember something about the cost of a business line in Rupert recently…
Using Beanaround’s logic. We should charge him $5 for every posts he makes here in HTMF, and $0.10 for every character over the 100 characters limit. Also, $0.50 for every minute spent logged in to this website.
LOL, Feliks would be super rich by then. 