How Citywest is ripping off cellular customers $6.95 each month

Just wait till Rogers set up shop and suddenly City"Rip-Off"West is able to lower their fees. I have spend some time in Alberta and Shaw charges flat rate $25 for phone service, no long distance charges in Canada and high speed internet included in the package. I hope the citywest phone answering and counter service will improof

I’ve known about this fee and what it really was for a while now. I’m really interested to see how this class action suit plays out.

No it’s not on pay as you go plans… just on all the contract plans
What you watch for on the pay-as-you-go is how fast the minutes expire. When the 7-11 ones first came out the minutes had to be used in 45 days. The solo minutes are good for 90 days, I often had to call someone just to use them up…

Good point Herbie. There can be quite a difference between plans. The 7-11 plan now has 365 day expiry. That’s pretty decent compared to the Petro-Canada plan which is 180 days.

SearsConnect is a contract plan, with no $6.95 screw-you fee.  Not even a 911 fee.  And a lot cheaper than Citywest.

It’s not about pay-as-you go or not.  It’s just that some companies just hope you won’t call them on it.

Citywest has been called on it.  “Everybody else does it” is not an excuse, it’s not accurate, it’s bullshit.  Everybody else does not do it.  Don’t make excuses for them.

7-11’s plan is 365-day expiry.  Free phone with $100 credit.  Roaming free anywhere in Canada.  Citywest isn’t going to come close to that.  And even if they did, they’d still charge you the $6.95 monthly go screw yourself fee that 7-11 won’t.    And no contract, no obligations, nothing.

I really like the 7-11 plan and pay-as-you-go really fits my usage. I pay a lot of money for a lot of cell service I don’t use.

Thanks CityWest.  :stuck_out_tongue:

Long time no post. One thing that most people don’t seem to know is that the SAF was a government fee a LONG time ago. Then it was no longer required. The cell companies didn’t update their definition of what the SAF was for quite a while. Only in 2004 when the threat of a lawsuit came about did the major carriers (not exactly sure about Citywest) specifically say that the SAF was a “non-governmental fee”. In the end, yeah, the major carriers will probably lose the case. In the end, there’ll probably be more “truth in advertising” with pretty close to the actual plan cost advertised, but really, the consumers aren’t going to win much. After 3+ years of litigation (and counting), the lawfirm who finally got this case class-action certified is going to be RICH.

BTW, Rupert’s finally getting out of the dark ages for cell phones? There’s never been GSM there that I can remember, and only analog for CDMA.

I’m thinking the same thing.  I’m gonna get the $100/free phone thing, and swap the SIM to an iPhone. 

Anyway, once we have lots of choice, I’m gonna get all the plans and maybe make a website comparing them all, including Citywest.

Hey MrBios!  What’s happening? 

I remember the good old days of the system access fee, when it was a legit government fee.  If you could prove you already had a radio license, it was waived.  At least, that was the policy of the pre-Aliant Newfoundland Telephone back in the day…  Was that the case here too?

Not entirely sure. It’s my understanding that spectrum was given to the current cellular providers initially, and how they repaid was through a government mandated “system access fee”. Sometime after the turn of the century, this fee was no longer required. But, cellular companies still charged this fee. Adding extra costs in itself is not illegal; but, still calling it a government mandated fee is. Once the threat of a lawsuit came up, and once the CRTC admitted this fee is no longer mandatory, everyone made sure to specify the SAF is a “non-governmental fee”. It is very much just a way to falsely advertise pricing.

Thanks, MiG! :sunglasses:
When my contract expires in June with CityWest Rogers will be established and I will have much to choose from.
I’m sure we will all have questions as we weigh options.  I know I will:-)

Astro - Check out the lest hand column of your scan. You ph number is still there several times.

Eep!!  Yeah, I can still see your number on the left hand side, Astro! :astonished:
Perhaps you should block those out as well.

Is there anyway to get data services with these pay as you go plans?

Crap you can tell i dont open my mail and read that shit, I have it paid directly,

you know whats sad, really sad is that I have full cable, full adsl and two cell phones and there is realy NO real Package deals, no savings, I pay over 250 a month for all that…

In 2005, after hearing for the first time that this $6.95 access was possibly being illegal charged to our cell phone bills, I contacted Citywest (Citytel) only to be told that they had heard the charge was being challenged, but they needed to collect this money to continually update their infrastructure.  However, the following comment out of the persons month was that they didn’t keep the money it went to the government.  Gee, I wonder why our city just discovered a $5 million dollar error if these are the kind of people they employee…

Is Rupert getting any kinda cable internet where you dont have to have
a phone line?
I hate paying for a line I dont even use.

I see all 3 still too!

I wonder if rogers is going to come to rupert, i bet citytel will change there charges and rates, you guys have text messaging yet or any thing like that ?

Id be lost with out text messaging i use it for work and personal use, GPS maping on the blackberry helps too.

Nope.  But, we will when Rogers comes in November.  Perhaps CityWest will spontaneously decide to give us these new fangled features. :smiley:

LOL, rogers is a better service, i think i have told and said why i like the GSM service already. CDMA is a pain in the ass to register a new phone, GSM simple as changing the sim card into another phone.

Rogers is sounding better and better.
CityWest…are you folks going to introduce any new services…like in the next two months? :smiley: