Canada’s largest privately owned telecommunications provider is getting into the mobile broadband business.

EastLink, which owns cable systems in communities across nine provinces, is constructing its own mobile phone and data network set to launch in 2012.  Part of that network will be its own competitive wireless mobile broadband service.

EastLink is using licensed wireless spectrum acquired in a 2008 federal auction which will allow it to provide cell service in Newfoundland, New Brunswick, north and southwest Ontario, and the metropolitan region of Grand Prairie, Alta.  But its first priority is delivering service on Prince Edward Island and in Nova Scotia, where EastLink is based.

“With this network evolution, our customers will be able to work and communicate more reliably and faster than ever before,” said Matthew MacLellan, president of EastLink Wireless.

EastLink subsidiary Delta Cable delivers cable service in western Canada.

EastLink’s new wireless network will use HSPA technology, presumably at the speeds most common in Canada — 21 or 42Mbps.  Ericsson is providing the equipment for the network.

EastLink has nearly a half-million customers, a tiny number in comparison to market leaders Bell, Rogers, and Telus.  But the company has a reputation for delivering advanced service, and is well-regarded in Atlantic Canada, especially for delivering Internet at speeds up to 100Mbps.

“They have a very strong reputation so they’ll be likely to shake up the market down there,” Brownlee Thomas, principal analyst at Forrester Research Inc., told The Wire Report.

EastLink’s primary focus is on its Canadian subscribers, but the company has also investments in Bermuda, and its subsidiary Delta Cable delivers service to one American community — the enclave of Point Roberts, Washington, located south of Delta, British Columbia.

A snake in the grass?

Cogeco customers trying to avoid usage-based overlimit fees are finding that difficult when the cable company’s online usage measurement tool is offline or misreads their usage.  But the real trouble comes when customers find themselves arguing over wild usage measurements with Cogeco’s customer service representatives, who believe their meter is sacrosanct.

Two Ontario customers report Cogeco’s meter is registering some wild usage numbers this week — measurements those customers say count against their monthly usage allowance, drive them into overlimit fees, or force them to try and convince Cogeco employees they didn’t use as much as the company claims they did.

Take “Jubenvi,” a Cogeco customer in Sarnia.  His efforts to check on his usage through Cogeco’s online measurement tool was an exercise in futility until Monday, when Cogeco claimed he used 36GB of usage the day before.

“Not a chance,” he argues on Broadband Reports‘ Cogeco customer forum.  “No warnings either and [the tool] says I’m at 153 percent [of my allowance].”

That means one thing: overlimit penalty fees of $1/GB + HST.

“Ya, I won’t be paying that,” he declares.

Petawawa customer RJBrake also found last Sunday a “heavy traffic day” for him as well, at least according to Cogeco’s usage meter.

“This is completely stupid,” he shared. “There’s no way I downloaded 14GB in a day.”

Jubenvi called Cogeco to complain and to demand the overlimit charges be waived for usage he never actually used.

That opened the door to a customer service investigation which could send shivers up some customers’ spines.  Cogeco tracks customer usage over several months, and claimed Jubenvi‘s past usage regularly exceeded their arbitrary usage allowance, so it’s a safe bet he downloaded 36GB in a single day.

Unwilling to concede their meter might be inaccurate, a representative issued a one-time “loyal customer courtesy credit.”

Surprise! Nearly 15GB of usage last Sunday, whether you used it or not.

Jubenvi was unimpressed with small favors.

“She [said] that a few times a month, someone in [my] family rents a few movies from iTunes store, [but] never 36GB a day,” Jubenvi explains.  “I [wondered aloud] what if this happens again and [asked] why I didn’t receive any 85% and 100% [usage allowance] warnings.”

Cogeco didn’t have answers for either question, content on placing the blame entirely at the feet of the customer.

“She just goes into how I should upgrade my computer — it could have a virus, [and] make sure I’m not using Netflix,” he says.

Unfortunately, Canadian ISP usage meters are largely unregulated.  A Hamilton customer notes:

The CRTC along with Weights and Measures Canada won’t do anything to help you. I along with others here have already tried to file complaints about Cogeco’s usage meter and they both say that this doesn’t follow under there pervue of duties.

At the moment we are on our own and I don’t see anyone that’s going to help us until an MP or a Court get involved in this situation. I personally think that some time after Oct. 1 when there is no [longer a maximum cap on overlimit fees] for the Ultimate 30 and 50Mbps customers, someone is going to get hacked and get a huge bill and then lawyers and the news media will then find this topic interesting.

Anyone that’s on an Ultimate 30 or 50Mbps account could easily download anywhere from 60GB to over 100GB’s a day. It’s simple. I can grab 1GB worth of data in under 10 minutes on my Ultimate 30 connection so multiply that by 24 hours and you get 72GB.

Industry Minister Christian Paradis just completed nearly two weeks of private meetings with some of Canada’s largest telecommunications companies regarding issues important to the industry, but has not scheduled face time with ordinary Canadian consumers or the public interest consumer groups that represent their interests.

Minister Paradis

Wire Report provided the schedule:

Aug. 16
Cogeco Cable Inc.
Shaw Communications Inc.
Quebecor Media Inc.
Globalive Wireless Management Corp.
Xplornet Communications Inc.
Public Mobile

Aug. 17
EastLink
BCE Inc.
Mobilicity
Telus Communications Co.

Aug. 22
Rogers Communications Inc.
MTS Allstream

Aug. 24
SaskTel

Bloomberg reports the primary topic on the agenda is upcoming spectrum auctions for additional wireless frequencies and loosening restrictions on foreign-ownership rules regarding would-be wireless competitors interested in entering Canada’s cell phone marketplace, which currently has the third-highest prices for mobile-phone services in the world, according to the OECD.

A rules change regarding foreign ownership may open the door...

Canadian telecom providers may not have more than 20 percent of their operations owned or controlled by foreign entities, a percentage that could be adjusted in the coming months.  But while changes in foreign ownership rules may benefit new entrants like Globalive Holdings, which operates Wind Mobile, it could also spell profound changes for millions of Canadians.  Industry analyst Dvai Ghose told Bloomberg he expects any relaxation of foreign-ownership rules may also pave the way for a mega merger of Bell and Telus.

“If you allow foreigners into our market, it becomes much more compelling to say we should allow one Canadian champion,” said Ghose, co-head of Canadian research at Canaccord Genuity.

That “champion” could quickly become Canada’s version of AT&T, dramatically reducing competition and raising prices, especially for captive landline customers who rely on the companies for broadband and landline service.  Telus and Bell currently compete with one another in the wireless market, where they would have an enormous share and combined market power should they be permitted to merge.

That would be a high price to pay for many Canadian consumers who do business with Bell or Telus, especially when contrasted with the fact Wind Mobile has attracted only 271,000 customers as of the end of March 2011.

...to a mega-merger of Bell and Telus.

Unfortunately, consumers are not included in Minister Paradis’ day-planner to share their views of further marketplace consolidation or wireless spectrum reform.  In fact, they don’t even have a right to learn what exactly was discussed during the closed door sessions.

A spokeswoman for Paradis, Pascale Boulay, would only confirm the minister met with 13 companies since Aug. 16, but refused to elaborate on the meetings.

Federal Communications Commission chairman Julius Genachowski tried this approach with some of America’s largest telecommunications companies last summer, holding a series of closed door meetings.  They eventually produced telecommunications policies so watered down, they neutralized Genachowski’s earlier commitments to protect Net Neutrality and foster additional competition.  Will Canada repeat America’s mistake?

Next time you wonder why you are paying substantially higher cell phone bills than your neighbors abroad, take note: just three cell phone companies control 94 percent of the wireless marketplace in Canada, with more than 23.5 million combined subscribers.  The four other significant carriers have a combined subscriber base of around 1.5 million, hardly worth noticing by the largest three:

Rogers Communications

The telecom giant Rogers controls the largest share of the Canadian wireless market with 9,127,000 subscribers as of the end of June.  Nearly 7.5 million of those customers are on two year contracts and pay an average bill of $70.07 per month.  Prepaid customers pay substantially less for their occasional-use phones: $16.14 a month.  Rogers adds more subscribers than it loses, picking up 591,000 new customers during the first quarter, while losing 456,000 current customers, winning a net gain of 135,000.

Data revenue is becoming increasingly important for Rogers, now constituting 35 percent of earnings for the company’s wireless division.

Bell

Coming in at second place is Bell Canada, with 7,283,000 customers.  Over 5.7 million are on contract, 1.6 million are using Bell prepaid phones.  Bell added just under 38,000 new customers last quarter, the smallest net add among the three largest providers.  The average contract customer pays Bell $63.18 a month; prepaid customers pay $16.88.

Telus Mobility

Telus, western Canada’s largest phone company, sells wireless service across the country and has become the third largest wireless provider with 5.8 million contract customers and 1.2 million prepaid clients.  Together, they pay an average of $58.88 a month.  Telus picked up 94,000 net additions last quarter, which is better than Bell but worse than Rogers.

Everyone Else

Among the rest, Saskatchewan’s phone company Sasktel had managed to reach 568,000 subscribers, mostly in the province, as of late March.  MTS Allstream Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Manitoba Telecom came in with 489,722 customers.  Videotron, Quebec’s biggest cable company, had 210,600 clients, mostly in Quebec.

Among the newest entrants, Wind Mobile, subject to considerable controversy for its foreign financial backing, may one day be a much larger player in Canada’s wireless marketplace, but not today.  It had just 271,000 customers as of March 31st.

Even fewer customers rely on some of Canada’s regional providers, which include companies like Thunder Bay Telephone, Lynx Mobility (co-owned by an aboriginal partner with a mission to serve rural Canada), Calgary-based AirTel, which is popular with oil/gas workers for its “push to talk” service, and Ice Wireless, which is the largest GSM carrier in northern Canada, reaching 70% of the population of Nunavut and the Northwest Territories.

Canada’s largest three providers also own or control several “competitors” that mostly sell prepaid service.  Customers thinking they are escaping the big boys often really are not:

• Fido is owned by Rogers;
• Virgin Mobile Canada is owned by Bell;
• Koodo Mobile is owned by Telus

Two years after Americans dumped analog television in favor of digital over the air broadcasting, in just over two weeks many Canadians will discover their favorite free-TV signals gone from the analog airwaves forever.

Canada’s transition to digital TV will take a substantial step forward on Aug. 31st when many Canadian local television stations cease broadcasting in analog.  Canada’s pay television providers are taking full advantage of the transition, trying to persuade Canadians who watch their television signals over-the-air for free they will be better off paying for those signals going forward.

Part of the problem is that digital television signals, while “snow-free,” are not pixel-free in many areas distant from the transmitter.  As Americans in suburban locations discovered, those trusty indoor rabbit ears may be insufficient to receive an annoyance-free picture.

Digital television signals are not the nirvana some suggest.  The same passing vehicles and aircraft that caused wavy analog pictures or other interference can turn a digital picture into a frightfest of frozen picture blocks, digital raining pixels, and other effects that can make watching a difficult signal near impossible.

For Americans who thought the days of the external rooftop antenna were behind them, digital television changed all that, especially in more rural areas that could live with a slightly snowy analog picture, but found sub-optimal digital signals unwatchable.

Canada’s vast expanse, and its accompanying large network of low powered television repeater stations rebroadcasting signals from major stations in provincial capitals and large Canadian cities may prove to be an even greater reception challenge, especially in the Canadian Rockies and hilly terrain in eastern Canada.

Some Canadians experimenting with digital-to-analog converter boxes have found reception less practical than they originally thought.

Peter, a Stop the Cap! reader who lives near Oshawa, Ontario delivers some difficult news:

“Reception of digital signals from Toronto’s CN Tower has proved to be a lot more difficult in Oshawa than the existing analog signals,” Peter writes.  “We have no trouble getting truly local signals like CHEX-TV, which has a transmitter in analog serving Oshawa, but watching digital signals from Toronto really requires an outside antenna for good reception.”

Snow may be a thing of the past, but bad digital reception like this may be here to stay for many Canadian viewers.

Peter’s decision to erect a rooftop antenna opened the door to reception of analog and digital signals from Toronto and across Lake Ontario, where he can receive digital signals from some stations in Buffalo and Rochester, N.Y.  But it was an expense of several hundred dollars to get the work done.

“Cable and satellite companies are taking full advantage of the digital switch to try and get free-TV viewers to ‘upgrade’ to pay television, and they don’t hesitate to mention the expense and hassle of erecting rooftop antennas to guarantee good digital reception,” Peter says.

Peter can only imagine what digital reception will be like in the Canadian Rockies, where large networks of analog, mostly low-powered UHF transmitters deliver basic reception to important networks, especially CBC, outside of major cities.

“If you visit western Alberta or eastern B.C., good luck to you — we could barely watch over the air signals in most of the mountain towns,” Peter says. “Most people either have cable or satellite already.”

Not every television transmitter is scheduled to switch off analog service at the end of August.  Many rural areas are expected to retain analog signals for some time, in part because of the expense of digital conversion and concerns about reception quality.  But some areas, particularly near the U.S. border, are scheduled to drop analog signals regardless, potentially causing disruptions for plenty of free-TV viewers.  Ottawa is anxious to auction off the vacated frequencies for cell phone, Wi-Fi and wireless broadband use for an estimated $4 billion, and the demand is highest in cities along the U.S. border.

“As many as 1.4 million English-language viewers and 700,000 Francophone viewers may be left without a CBC signal,” Ian Morrison, spokesman for the non-profit Friends of Public Broadcasting, which monitors the CBC and promotes Canadian content on TV and radio told the Toronto Star. “For the most part, these are poorer and older people on fixed incomes who are of no interest to advertisers, but who rely for their news and connection to the community on the CBC, the nearest thing we have in this country to a public broadcaster.”

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission runs a website regarding the transition and includes a list of impacted television stations.  Canadian consumers who elect to purchase converter boxes for their analog televisions will pay full price for them — Ottawa has not followed Washington’s lead subsidizing their purchase with a coupon program.

Meanwhile, many pay television providers are running “digital TV upgrade” specials trying to get Canadians to walk away from free TV in favor of paid video packages:

Shaw Direct: Shaw’s direct to home satellite service has developed the best offer around for qualifying residents in 20 Canadian cities set to lose analog television: free service.

“The Local Television Satellite Solution is [for] households in 20 designated cities that have been receiving their television services over-the-air, and will lose over-the-air access to their local broadcaster because the analog transmitter is being shut down and will not be replaced by a digital transmitter,” a Shaw spokesperson told the Toronto Star. “Shaw will provide a household in a qualifying area with a free satellite receiver and dish that is authorized to receive a package of local and regionally relevant signals from Shaw Direct. There are no monthly programming fees provided that a household qualifies to participate in the program.”

The qualifying cities:

For everyone else, Shaw Direct’s least expensive package is their Bronze – English Essentials tier which runs $41.99 a month.

Rogers Cable: Rogers is marketing a special package called Rogers Digital TV which offers up to 85 channels for $10.14 a month, which includes all fees.  Many of the channels are included for the first year as a teaser.  After that, customers are left with mostly local stations and filler (including — we’re not kidding — the Aquarium Channel, which shows exactly what you think it does.  Remember, this is the same cable company that brought you the Swiss Chalet Rotisserie Channel.)

“It’s a fine way to get people used to paying for television, and Rogers introductory price is sure to increase at some point,” suspects Peter.  “Maybe you can save a few dollars using those Swiss Chalet meal coupons, though.”

Telus: Western Canada’s largest phone company doesn’t offer much, in comparison.  A basic package of Telus IPTV over your phone line — Optik TV — starts at $41 a month for the first six months.  Telus Satellite TV starts at $38.27 a month, for the first half of a year.  Prices run higher after that.  The most Telus will toss in is a $50 credit for a customer referral from a friend or family member.

Look on the bright side: When you pay for Rogers Cable, you can finally get to watch The Rotisserie Channel. The spinning chickens are waiting for you, in digital clarity, 24 hours a day on Ch. 208.

Bell: Another phone company with not a whole lot on offer.  Bell’s basic service, which includes TV stations from the U.S. and Canada, starts at $33.50 a month.

Videotron: Quebec’s largest cable company is pitching a combo mini-pack with basic service for $21.29 a month and a required extra channel package starting at $11.17 a month.  That’s around $33 a month.

Can you watch online?  The CRTC says you may find many of your favorite shows available online for free viewing, but includes the important caveat: most Canadian ISP’s engage in classic Internet Overcharging schemes that include a monthly usage allowance that will curtail substantial online viewing.  It should come as little surprise most of the providers in the pay television business in Canada also happen to be the largest Internet Service Providers as well.

About 93 percent of Canadians currently receive television from some form of pay television provider — cable, telco TV, or satellite, according to the CBC.  But some of the 7 percent who do not are at risk of losing Canada’s public broadcaster after the conversion.  While CBC owns most of the stations and transmitters it broadcasts from, it also affiliates with private stations in certain cities where it does have its own presence.

Come Sept. 1, no over-the-air CBC signals of any kind will be transmitted from London and Kitchener-Waterloo in Ontario; Sherbrooke, Chicoutimi, Quebec City and Trois-Rivières in Quebec; Saint John and Moncton in New Brunswick; Saskatoon, Sask., and Lethbridge, Alta.  These are all cities where private stations provided CBC service.  Viewers in these areas will need a pay television subscription, or simply go without.

For some of those already subscribing to cable, Sept. 1 also signals the end of some of their favorite stations, as CRTC requires cable providers to prioritize local stations over more distant ones.  In southeastern Ontario, for example, a number of viewers will lose access to CBLT, Toronto’s CBC station, and CFTO, Toronto’s CTV affiliate, in favor of “more local” stations in Kingston, Ottawa, and Peterborough.