The CRTC this morning announced it has denied an application by Bell Canada, Bell Aliant Regional Communications and Télébec to increase their payphone rates from up to $1 for cash calls (due to the new Loonie) and up to $2 per credit card payment calls. TELUS told the CRTC it had no plans to raise payphone rates, which are currently at $0.35 per call in BC and Alberta.
Bell argued if the rate increases were approved, it would also increase revenues, thus justify keeping payphones around instead of removing them, since the majority of Canadians now use cellphones.
#CRTC denies Bell companies’ request to increase local payphone rates http://t.co/lhHOoT530h
— CRTCeng (@CRTCeng) July 16, 2013
Jean-Pierre Blais, Chairman of the CRTC said “This trend is likely to continue regardless of the rate charged for pay phone services, and highlights the need to reassess the role of payphones.”
CRTC Launches Public Consultation on Payphones
The CRTC wants to hear your comments on whether telephone companies should be prevented from removing the last payphones in a community, until a fact-finding process is complete.
“This consultation will give us a clearer picture of how payphones are being used and by whom,” said Mr. Blais. “It will also help us assess how possible rate increases and the removal of payphones may affect Canadians, and whether any regulatory action is necessary.”
Canadians can give their input online using this form, with the deadline for comments set for August 13, 2013, while the fact-finding process comments will be due on October 22, 2013.
Gee, whatever happened to paying $0.25 to use a payphone? What do you think? Should payphones stick around? They do come in handy when your cellphone battery has died.
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Payphone and landlines are useful in case of a power outage since they run nonetheless. I admit that it has become expensive, one has to admit that pay phones are less and less used nowadays.
I heard there was a time when it was 10 cents lol. They should just do away with them and have the cities install, or the government, emergency phones, so when the power goes out, and they can also be used for collect calls.
I don’t see the big deal. Bell wants to make money, and now that more and more people have cellphones, fewer use Public Telephones. 1$ sounds high, but if you need it once in a while I don’t see the problem… 2$ is ridiculous tho
Telus should set up in place of all the Bell phones.
I could care less i never use them. Not trying to be rude here, but i do see a lot of people with addictions or people living on the streets using them and this maybe too much for them. why not slowly raise the prices instead of 35cents to a dollar?
Not to be rude either. But if they know payphones are not cheap now, they might not spend that much money on drugs.
They are useless even if our cellphone batteries die because most of us don’t care to memorize any phone numbers anymore