Fido is stealing from its customers

[tamcham]

In Nov 2019 I got a consolidated plan of 2 years (Data+Iphone). 

I have auttomatic payments set up and don't check my fido account regularly since I don't make a lot of changes to my plan and account.

2 years passed and I had already paid the balance for my Iphone. I expected Fido to send me an email warning at least 1 month before or something that I have to change my plan. I was shocked to see that were still withdrawing the same 109$ monthly payment for the phone although I finished paying for it. I called and asked them to credit me the extra money they were stealing from me. Instead of helping out, they gave me a lecture about self-management. I work in customer experience and I know for a fact that this is not the right way to do things (Steal from customers and expect they don't notice). I have so many friends and family members complaining about Fido. They basically lost my trust. I don't know how they expect to retain their clients with this strategy. I want to switch to another service provider. Any recommendations? 

[Cawtau · Accepted solution]

Hello Tamcham,

  Welcome to the community!

  Sorry to hear of your situation. However, it is unfortunate that you did not understand your contract. If you started your contract in 2019, your plan would have been a subsidised plan.

Many mobile providers used a subsidised model for their contract devices. This model is different from a tab or financed model or the more recently available leasing model.

  With the subsidised model, the subsidy is incorporated into the plan (ie small, large, etc). Since the subsidy is incorporated into the plan, your plan does not automatically switch to a BYOP plan at the end of a contract (see here). It is not possible to merely remove the device cost from those plans.

  That said, you should note that Fido has now switched from their subidised plans to a financed payment program for new devices. That is, the cost of devices is now separate from the cost of services. Once the payments have competed with the new program, your only remaining monthly costs would be for services.

  Since you have a subsidised plan, your monthly billing will not automatically be reduced once you have paid the balance of the phone. As already mentioned, it is not possible to simply remove the subsidy from older plans so you would need to switch to a new plan. However, you should note that the details of the new plans may not be the same as your current plan. If you did not switch plans, you will not automatically get a new cellphone. In order to finance another device, you would also need to switch to a new plan as the old subsidised plans are not compatible with the new financed model.

  I understand you work in customer relation services and feel that you have been mistreated. However it is the customers' responsibility to monitor their own usage and bills. In addition, customers should know the type of contract they enter. You're accusing Fido of stealing when you don't know the details of the plan you chose. I also understand you are upset that they didn't tell you that your contract was ending. It's not a company's responsibility to inform customers of their contract end dates.

Hope this helps 😀

Cheers

[OviOneKenobi]

What is a " subidised" plan. Must be sub ( under something. A fair linguistic logic inference. 

And "It's not a company's responsibility to inform customers of their contract end". It's  true. It's the law.

I love when we. all agree.

[FidoVan]

Hey there @OvionveKenobi

A subsidised plan is a plan where its price include the fees for the services and the fee for the financing of the device. We used that old financing system before we came up with the new one where the fees of the plan and the fees of the device are now separated from each other on your invoice for better clarifty.

Hope that helps.

- FidoVan