Most. Expensive. Movies. Ever.
- December 12, 2007 5:30 PM |
- By Pete Nowak
By Peter Nowak, CBCNews.ca
Poor Piotr Staniaszek. The 22-year-old Calgary resident racked himself up an $85,000 cellphone bill by using his handset as a modem. To anyone who has followed the cellphone industry in Canada, horror stories about sky-high bills are nothing new - but this one definitely takes the cake.
On the one hand Staniaszek made a very big mistake. He neglected to read the fine-print (a cardinal sin of cell use in Canada) and now he has to pay the price. Also, to run up a download bill that high, one would suspect he was engaging in some file sharing. Some would say that's a double offence, so in the end his huge bill serves him right.
In reality though, if you do the math, Staniaszek probably didn't do all that much wrong. Under most of Bell's data plans, users get only four megabytes of downloading and pay a whopping $12 per megabyte thereafter. That means Staniaszek's $85,000 bill boils down to about seven gigabytes worth of downloading. In real-world terms, that's a couple of movies. With data rates like these, who needs lawsuits from entertainment companies?
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Comments (13)
Peter Nowak: "one would suspect he was engaging in some file sharing" that's a very bold suggestion considering there a many big files that a person can download on a daily basis that have NOTHING to do with Filesharing. Game Demos and Download only game services like Steam. I personally have a 60 gig Steam game folder that was downloaded over a couple months.
The entire basis for this article appears to be based on personal assuptions and theory.
When are the the canadian cell phone companies going to come in line with the rest of the world. I have to conduct business around my cell phone and their data plans would be funny if it wasn't so sad.
John
www.fighting.ca
This is exactly what I expect from Canadian cellphone carriers. This unreasonable data rate is just one of the many ways we are at a disadvantage compared with the cell industry in the US. The problem is well documented; lack of competition. Just 3 companies providing cell service in a country as large as Canada? No wonder we have to deal with these outragous rates... We have no choice.
There has to be some solution to this problem!! This is an extreme example of a situation that technologically does not need to exist. It is an abuse of power [and knowledge] held by the cellphone providers. I hope the poor customer can find some courageous lawyer who will take on a fight to stop these outrageous billing practices. It should be a simple step in the application/activation process to inform customers of high $ billing potentials and to impose $ limits on usage categories [except flat rate plans, of course] for each customer account. Billing computers can easily monitor $ usage and inform customers via prerecorded cell &/or text messages.
As an update to this, the Globe and Mail reports that Bell has offered to lower the bill to $3,243, as a gesture of "good will".
Even still, thats a surprising sum for a couple months of "unlimited" wireless internet, which Bell enticed Piotr with, by giving him an introductory period of unlimited usage.
All things considered, a 82 000 dollar decrease in his bill is a very big showing of good will. I don't think ignorance is an acceptable excuse.
Though I bet it sucks to be this guy.
Gord, what if the provider assumed that Piotr read and understood all the rules and regulations of the contract? Why should they have to monitor their customers when they assume the signature on each contract insures a complete understanding of everything on that contract?
Ok, I'll agree that there is a major problem here with reagard to the cost Bell has associated with data usage - but at some point we have to look at personal responsibility! I could see that this guy might have overlooked the fine print, but he was told by Bell that his Nov bill was at $65,000! Why did he keep using the service for another month and let the charges rack-up to the $85,000?
This whole scenario seems ridiculous to start with - why would anyone try downloading gigabytes worth of data through a cell phone? The speed isn't anything near a regular broadband connection and a cell phone isn't designed to be used to this degree. He must have literally had that phone connected to his computer 24 hours a day!
As for the idea that Bell should warn customers when they excede regular usage, I think that is completely inappropriate. I regularly go over my alloted minutes and end up paying for more - but I have enough sense to know that I am doing it and I accept that it is going to cost me. I would be immensely annoyed if Bell constantly sent my messages as a warning.
My home computer does monthly data communications of about 60 GB - I'm not downloading movies, but I do watch streaming video that I've subscribed to - mainly Canadian sources such as BNN - partly owned by Bell. I also listen to a jazz station online that is located just across the border - an NPR station that is nice relaxing music while I sit working at the computer.
That said, various ISPs have limits on volume of data, and honestly, the wireless phone system isn't designed for the volume of data Piotr was moving for the most part. Maybe a 3G/4G style network can do that, and in Europe, T-Mobile offers devices for just that, wireless 4G modems giving DSL equivalent speed, but I'm not aware of Bell being at that point yet.
But honestly, data packages are ridiculous in Canada - Rogers still charges $3 for a quarter of a megabyte of data on my father's phone (he's on my bill) and just corrected some billing mistakes after dropping the data package on my phone by giving me 5 megabytes for $5. I've thought of Blackberry services as I live on data, for Internet, IM, email and text messaging, but while in the US I could have unlimited Blackberry and unlimited messaging for about $35, here the service is crippled with very low data levels offered in any package.
Not effectively available in Canada? Pity.
Upon moving back to Canada after 9 years and touting the lack of technology availability in a developing nation like Pakistan, I was astounded to note the lack of development in terms of the wireless world here. Even in Pakistan I had to pay a mere $ 8/month to get unlimited data plans through my cellphone service. Since I have moved here, I am completely dependent on fixed line internet due to the exorbitant data rates. Maybe its time we live up to our claim of a developed country and offer services that actually enable people to use them effctively in their daily lives.
Currently, its not impossible to use the internet on my Fido phone, if only I made $ 100K + a year maybe. Increased competition must be allowed for better services in the GSM market to not limit users to the standard phones (archiac in technology terms) by at least some other countries' standards.
I'm astonished by the bill, astonished by Bell's "goodwill" gesture of reducing their profit margin on the service to a single order of magnitude... but overriding everything is my astonishment that someone could find a way to download that much data over a cell phone. It's a PHONE, people. Protecting this poor fellow from the costs of downloading that volume of data is like suing an all-you-can-eat buffet when your stomach ruptures.
I can actually picture Mr. Staniaszek grinning in satisfaction as he read the word "unlimited" and decided to devour every byte he could cram in, "getting his money's worth." I'm as hesitant to protect his rights as I am to defend Bell's right to bill him two years' salary.
The moral? Read the fine print, don't bleed your customers, and to both sides I say: "all you can eat" means "eat until you're full," not "eat until you're sick."
The way cell providers rig their billing schemes reminds of how retail chains sell gift cards with expiry dates: of course one can argue you have to read the fine print to avoid getting burned, but the fact is there's a certain 'social engineering' aspect to this that causes a known percentage of people to rip themselves off, so to speak, and this equates to massive profits. The fact that this guy was even able to create such large debt in the first place regardless of the clients (mis)use just screams at how absurd the billing schemes can be, irregardless of fine print and bait-and-switch marketing tactics.
Just like an expired gift card, in the end you are not receiving the value of the purchase and the sellers profits multiply exponentially, which in my mind is borderline fraudulent, if not poor ethics.
The situation is similar in Australia. High access fees, only 3 carriers (with several hundred 'resellers') and deliberately confusing contracts. Mobile phone debt due to overuse is a big problem for some (mostly young) people talked into unfair, long-term contracts.
There is currently no unlimited domestic broadband plan available, and speeds are slower than in most third-world countries.
god bless the CRTC fro doing such a great service to
us Canadians.....
B A L D E R D A S H!!