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City of Vancouver Passes Anti-UBB Resolution

The City of Vancouver has passed a resolution calling on the CRTC to reverse its usage based billing decision. While a municipal resolution obviously is not binding on the telecom regulator, the move places the spotlight on growing frustration with wireless and Internet services in Canada.  It also comes on the same week that the NDP promoted Rogers’ decision to unlock cellphones (albeit for a $50 fee), noting their private members bill on the issue.

3 Comments

  1. Rogers will charge you $50 to unlock *your* phone. And the reason *your* phone was locked in the first place is because Rogers required the manufacturer to lock it.

    So, to recap: Rogers cripples your phone and then charges you $50 to uncripple. This new policy is hardly a major win.

    Oh, and let’s not forget that if the phone is being subsidized via a contract, Rogers will not unlock it. This is despite the fact that it’s your *phone* (not a lease, or rental from Rogers). Rogers does this to prevent you from popping in a cheap US carrier SIM card when traveling in the US. It’s only after the contract is up (typically 3 years) that Rogers will unlock your now woefully technologically out-of-date phone.

    There needs to be one simple law to address this: locked phones cannot be sold in Canada.

  2. WTF do locked phones have to do with the resolution that the City of Vancouver passed with regards to UBB?


  3. Remember that in the end consumer protection laws are provincial jurisdiction. So even if CRTC says UBB is OK, if this movement gets momentum in British Columbia, then you could have a provincial law saying that you can’t sell UBB plans there.

    Nap.