Canadians continue to disconnect home phone lines
Last Updated: Tuesday, March 31, 2009 | 9:09 AM ET
The Canadian Press
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Canadians are ditching their landline phones at a rate that will escalate over the next few years, according to a Toronto-based market research company.
A report released Monday by the Convergence Consulting Group, which specializes in cable and internet companies, suggests that domestic wireless subscribers will abandon their landline telephone subscriptions at a rate of nine per cent each year in 2010 and 2011.
That compares with a line-loss rate of seven per cent last year, and predictions of a 7.5 per cent rate this year.
The report also says that 45 per cent of subscribers who cancel residential phone subscriptions with telecom companies in 2011 will do so because they're using wireless phones instead. That's up from a current rate of 20 per cent, it said.
Cable companies will continue to gain a position in the residential phone market, representing 29 per cent of home telephone subscriptions by the end of this year, up from 24 per cent in 2008.
However, Convergence's founder Brahm Eiley said cable providers offering both wireless and landline offerings are going to see their revenue streams challenged as consumers rethink how much they need their landline.
"They're going to face an issue around cannibalization at some point," Eiley said in an interview.
He suggested companies like Shaw Communications Inc. and Rogers Communications Inc. will have to come up with plans that encourage customers to keep their landline services, such as offering long-distance minutes that are transferable between both phones.
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