A retired Rogers insider is asking the CRTC to ban advance billing, the practice that has nearly every Canadian paying for phone, internet and TV service 30 days before using it, according to the Toronto Star.
Stephen Lawton, 74, spent 18 years as a senior adviser in the office of the president at Rogers, sitting at the top of the complaint chain. He wants carriers forced to bill in arrears, the way electricity and water utilities do (meaning you pay for service after you have received it).
“The system is broken by design,” Lawton told the Star, adding that the CRTC “has never questioned the design.”
His frustration peaked in November 2025, when his partner ported a Fido number to Koodo four days into a billing cycle. Lawton figured they owed roughly $4.10. Fido billed the full $42.38, then tacked on a $1.22 late fee when he refused to pay what he calls a “phantom” balance.
The CRTC told the Star it does not “prescribe whether telecommunications service providers bill customers in advance or in arrears,” and has never commissioned research on it. The regulator requires pro-rated refunds when contracts end, but sets no deadline for how quickly carriers must return the money.
Telus said it automatically credits customers for prepaid days they didn’t use, applied to the final bill.
Billing disputes made up 46 per cent of all complaints in the telecom ombud’s 2024-25 report, the largest single category. Nowadays, telecoms force you to submit to pre-authorized autopay (either through your bank account or credit card) to get the maximum discounts.
Rogers and Bell did not respond to the Star. But the Canadian Telecommunications Association called advance billing “a long-standing industry practice in Canada and internationally.”
Canadians can submit comments to the CRTC until August 11, with a public hearing beginning in Gatineau on November 30.
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Fido has increased my plan twice in a year, totalling a 10 dollar increase. I want to pay less for less data. I don’t use 20 GB let alone 60.
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The thing is for the same plan, different people pay different price and that’s descrimination! We live in society where we learn and teach our kids not to descriminate but these companies do! Why cant we have fixed Price for plan like rest of the world does!
Thanks for covering this. One piece that tends to get left out, and it’s the part that makes this more than a consumer gripe: ending advance billing would save the carriers money.
Every complaint accepted by the CCTS costs the carrier a fee, and that fee escalates as the complaint moves through the process. One resolved at first contact is cheap; one that goes to conciliation or formal investigation costs considerably more. Now notice which complaints escalate: the ones where the customer can’t get anyone to explain the balance. That’s precisely the situation advance billing creates when someone cancels mid-cycle. The practice systematically pushes disputes up the expensive ladder, and the carriers fund the ladder.
Add the administrative cost of processing prorated refunds, mailing cheques, and staffing the disputes, and the arithmetic isn’t close. Billing for service already delivered eliminates the entire category. There’s no advance charge to become incorrect, and no prepaid amount to credit back. The only real cost is a one-time cash-flow adjustment during transition, which is manageable for companies of this size and offset by ongoing savings.
Two things from the article worth sitting with. The CRTC confirms it has never commissioned research on advance billing. That’s the gap, stated by the regulator itself. And the industry’s answer is that it’s “a long-standing industry practice.” That’s not a defence of the practice; it’s a description of its age. Three-year wireless contracts were long-standing too, until the Commission decided consumer protection required otherwise.
The consultation is open until August 11 and filing takes about fifteen minutes. Submissions went from 14 to over 90 in the first day after the Star piece. Apparently the question resonates.
For anyone who wants to go further:
File your own submission (click Submit on the 2026-134 row; Interventions shows what others have filed):
applications.crtc.gc.ca/portail-portal/eng/listes-lists/public-proceedings/18#2026-134
The full series, including my filed intervention:
canadiansnowmansays.substack.com/s/your-phone-bill-and-mine
— Stephen Lawton