The latest plans from Telus and Bell now come with more expensive data overages, as Canadians will now pay the price for going over their allotted data buckets.
Bell recently increased their data overages from $0.07 per megabyte to $0.10 per megabyte, which works out to a jump from $7/100MB to $10/100MB, or $70/1GB to $102.40/1GB (updated).
The company told MobileSyrup these price increases only apply to new plans and will not affect existing customers on previous plans.
Bell’s website notes “additional data is $0.10/MB” at the bottom of their wireless plan page when selecting a data option:
As for Telus, the company has followed suit with Bell at charging $100/1GB for data overages, but customers get charged $10/200MB for the first 1GB in overages (rounded up to the nearest 100MB), which works out to $50/1GB. Any overages after that are billed at $0.10/MB, or $102.40/1GB (updated).
The company’s website now reads:
Additional data usage will be charged to the subscriber using the data at $10/200 MB for the first 1000 MB (rounded up to the closest 100 MB at the end of the billing cycle). Usage thereafter will be charged to the subscriber using the data at 10¢/MB.
As of writing, the Rogers website still notes data overages are billed at $7/100MB, but given how wireless prices surprisingly increase at the same time in Canada, expect a matching increase at some point in the near future.
As for flanker brands Fido, Virgin and Koodo? If parent companies increase the price of data overages, expect it to be a change across the board, but for now, they remain at $7/100MB.
It’s worth noting the CRTC Wireless Code says carriers must limit domestic data overages to $50 in a billing cycle. Any usage after that requires consent from a customer to continue. Exactly one year ago, Rogers increased the price of its data overages from $50/1GB to $70/1GB, and Bell and Telus followed shortly with the same increases.
