Customer Input on Shaw "Internet Usage Allowances"

News, discussion and questions about technology and computers, whether broadcast-related or not.

Customer Input on Shaw "Internet Usage Allowances"

Postby jon » Tue Feb 08, 2011 4:41 pm

NEWS RELEASE
SHAW TO ENGAGE CUSTOMERS IN CONSULTATION PROCESS ON INTERNET USAGE ALLOWANCES
CALGARY, AB (February 8, 2011) – Shaw Communications Inc. announced today that it will invite
customers to participate in consultation sessions to share thoughts on Internet usage allowances
and billing.

“We have been listening to the discussion taking place and determined that we want to hear directly
from our own customers before we roll out any kind of program. Wherever we end up needs to
work first and foremost for our customers,” said Peter Bissonnette, President of Shaw
Communications.

Shaw will conduct customer discussion sessions in all its serving regions in addition to creating
opportunities to contribute feedback online. Customers will be invited to share their ideas with
senior Shaw leaders who will participate in the sessions throughout February and March.

Until this thorough consultation with customers has taken place, Shaw will not implement Internet
usage billing. To date, no Shaw Internet customer has received a bill for any usage based charges.
“Bandwidth is not unlimited and that is the crux of the issue. There are many potential solutions to
this challenge and we’re asking for our customers’ help to build a solution that works for everyone,”
said Bissonnette.

“Our customers choose to use the Internet in different ways and it has become an essential part of
our daily lives,” continued Bissonnette. “We want to build pricing and packaging options that deliver
choice, quality and value to all our customers.”
User avatar
jon
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 9256
Joined: Mon May 08, 2006 10:15 am
Location: Edmonton

Re: Customer Input on Shaw "Internet Usage Allowances"

Postby i2thesky » Tue Feb 08, 2011 10:06 pm

I work for a smaller ISP that is facing the same challenge. We've plotted all of our users on a graph over a month. We have a customer base of 8500. The top 100 users are gobbling up 85% of the available bandwidth, while the remaining 8400 consume the rest. We have issued letters to the top 100 abusers stating that if they do not voluntarily curb their use, capping and additional per gigabyte charges "may be necessary". More of a precautionary warning that changes are in order. Although we are a "no limits" residential provider, that falls under the realm of acceptable use, and residential users who bit-torrent non stop 24/7 are causing our network to have major capacity issues, thus affecting "normal" users to the point that it becomes abusive. Then again, 5 years ago, consuming 300 + gigabytes in a month seemed incomprehensible unless you were a business running servers. Nowadays, very common place.

I for one think that imposing usage caps is in order. Last mile and operation costs are pretty high for any ISP, big and small. Keep in mind, IPV6 is coming soon and many routers and switches will need to be replaced or upgraded because they are either incompatible with IPV6 or will run at very slow processing speeds. That will end up costing millions.
User avatar
i2thesky
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 136
Joined: Tue Sep 04, 2007 10:32 am

Re: Customer Input on Shaw "Internet Usage Allowances"

Postby jon » Mon Feb 14, 2011 5:26 pm

Three Edmonton-area meetings set for March
By Journal Business Staff, edmontonjournal.com
February 14, 2011 4:24 PM

EDMONTON — Edmonton customers of Shaw Communications Inc. can have their say on usage-based billing at two meetings March 8 and 21, the company said Monday.

But the meetings will be by invitation only and limited to 40 Shaw customers each. Others can phone or e-mail their comments.

Shaw announced last week it was shelving plans to charge customers extra for exceeding their usage limits until after seeking customer feedback at sessions with executives and online.

Shaw president Peter Bissonnette said last week the company was caught in a consumer backlash sparked by a recent CRTC ruling that small Internet providers that lease network space from bigger companies impose the same bandwidth caps as the larger firms.

There will be 35 meetings, which will all include a vice-president from the head office in Calgary.

St. Albert will have a session on March 7.

No addresses for the meetings were released Monday.

To make it a representative group of low-, mid- and high use customers, people interested in attending must request an invitation by e-mailing shawfeedback@sjrb.ca, a Shaw spokesperson said.

“We want to explore all of the alternatives and we’re already seeing some constructive and interesting suggestions from customers who have sent in their thoughts,” Bissonnette said in a news release.

“As we said last week, bandwidth is not unlimited and that is the crux of the issue. We believe there are many potential solutions to this challenge. We’re asking for our customers’ help to build Internet options that work for everyone.”

ref. - http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/Sha ... story.html
User avatar
jon
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 9256
Joined: Mon May 08, 2006 10:15 am
Location: Edmonton

Re: Customer Input on Shaw "Internet Usage Allowances"

Postby Mike Cleaver » Mon Feb 14, 2011 5:45 pm

"Bandwidth is not unlimited."
Bullshit!
How do countries such as Japan and Korea and others with much larger populations than Canada offer their people unlimited bandwidth, very high speeds and very low prices compared to what we get here?
If it's so tough for these companies to provide us with good, fairly priced services, why not let most of us who live within 50 miles of the border use US services?
Shaw, Bell, Rogers, Cogeco and the rest of the Canadian majors all make millions of dollars in profits every year.
They can add more bandwidth cheaply.
By charging a hundred times what it costs over the actual cost of a gigabyte, they'll be gouging us even more.
They simply want to put any of their smaller independent competitors out of business.
DO SOME RESEARCH.
We have the lousiest, most expensive, slowest internet, highest cell phone prices and lousiest cable television and satellite service among civilized countries, regulated by a bunch of old men who don't get technology and are all in the pocket of the big boys.
Mike Cleaver Broadcast Services
Engineering, News, Voice work and Consulting
Vancouver, BC, Canada

54 years experience at some of Canada's Premier Broadcasting Stations
User avatar
Mike Cleaver
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 2085
Joined: Sat Apr 29, 2006 6:56 pm
Location: Vancouver

Re: Customer Input on Shaw "Internet Usage Allowances"

Postby slowhand » Mon Feb 14, 2011 6:13 pm

I have to say that I am quickly coming to the conclusion that the largest Internet Broadband providers in this country believe that they can turn these services into the same kind of profit margins that cell phone service had before the current set of competitors showed up on the scene. I remember some TELUS Mobility guy in the late 1990s, just before the merger with BC TEL, bragging that for every dollar of revenue received, less than 20 cents was spent on costs.

I'm hard pressed to think of a (legal) business that even expects those kinds of profit margins, let alone gets them.

Lest you think that all the telcos got rich: in the late 1990s, the other 80-plus cents ("profit margin") was used to keep the rest of the company afloat now that long distance competition had started and, before that, the crippling effect of customers being able to own their own telephone equipment rather than being forced to rent it from the telephone company. They were also facing huge costs associated with Internet and TELUS TV development and roll out, which both cost them much more to provide than cable companies, but they had to charge the same price. The two modems for a single high speed Internet line cost them $1500 not including the cost of the rack in the telephone office, where they could only use every second slot, because the modems generated too much heat. And then there was the huge costs of getting ready for Y2K.
User avatar
slowhand
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 756
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 2:03 pm


Return to Computer & Technology News

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 106 guests