So after I asked the operator Mihaela about whether she saw the humour in the one and only option she was giving me: to cancel my phone service that does not allow incoming or outgoing calls by accepting an incoming call (again - something my phone service lied to me and said they could provide but cannot do, and one of the reasons I'm cancelling) she typed that she did not find it funny and that it's a procedure applied by all the companies in Canada.
I imagine she meant all the cellphone companies in Canada but who knows? Maybe, like other reprehensible business practices such as averaging agreements and hiring only part-timers it's sweeping the nation. Anyhow, I asked her (I'm attaching the female gender to Mihaela but I could be wrong) why Koodo doesn't make it mandatory to SIGN UP by phone and she gave me some shit like the possibility of fraudulent information (which goes both ways) and because "the rules and regulations of Canada don't allow it." I had to fact check that. Of course I found that not only is all the shit they say is "dangerous" or a fraud risk - but is perfectly fine for signing up - legal and in compliance with the rules and regulations of Canada, NOT allowing it is AGAINST the rules and regulations of Canada. Because it makes cancellation harder than signing up and that's goddamned properly against the law.
The Better For Consumers, Better for Business Act, Bill 142 of 2023 prohibits businesses from making it difficult for consumers to cancel subscriptions or membership-based contracts. It is the law in Ontario but it will not come into force until the Lt. Gov. of Ont. sets a date. HOLY SHIT he must be getting rich from companies like Koodo and Telus right about now "lobbying" her to delay that date! Keep an eye on Edith Dumont's bank account. The old Consumer Protections Act had a line that required companies to make cancelling subscriptions or contracts "as easy as signing up for it." That's the legislation in which you will find the rules and regulations that apply to my business with Koodo and which they are blatantly disregarding. I felt like telling her to stop lying to me but didn't. If she or Koodo gave half a hunk of shit about rules and regulations they'd know they are flagrantly violating them by making it too hard to cancel their subscriptions/memberships. However, the problem is partly what Mihaela said: it's a procedure applied all across Canada, and partly because there's a metric shit ton of money to be made by fucking the little people of Canada until Bill 142 becomes law nationwide and starts getting enforced nationwide.
The agency, board, commission that would be in charge of that I think would be the agency in charge of making outrageous cellphone costs in Canada come down - the Competition Bureau - and judging by the success (???) we're told they're having with the former but how "complicated" it is to show... this could be a while. Here's an article that tells us something like prices ARE going down while providers ARE making more. It also includes our beloved PM saying that part of the goal was to - you guessed it - make plans easier to cancel. How we doin' with that???
I'm going to ask a question I know the answer to, and so do you: Why the fuck is Bill 142 not the law all across Canada and why the fuck did it take until 2023 to be the law ANYWHERE in Canada? Right now in the US Amazon, a HUGE company, is being sued for doing precisely this. Here's a little NPR listening and reading you can do on that story.
The Iliad Flow. As in cancelling some service/membership/subscription being about as arduous as the fucking Trojan War! That's how I felt trying to cancel my internet with Telus (they are STILL harassing me by the way) and that's how I feel now with Koodo. Well what do you know! Koodo is a subsidiary of Telus!
So is the US Federal Trade Commission better at regulating corporate greed and mitigating the antitrust techniques that are employed by so many unscrupulous businesses than the equivalent agency in Canada? YUP! One might even draw the conclusion from this that the US has been surpassed in pure capitalism - I mean down-in-the-dirt chicanery and customer ass rape - by Canada! As long as we ignorantly comply with the rules and regulations we are told exist but do not; as long as we spinelessly comply with abhorrent business practices that we are told are commonplace but are not; as long as we insanely elect representatives to govern us who tell us they will rectify the evil that greed has wrought but will not, we are at least enablers and at worst complicit participants in the problem.
I won't be paying Koodo another cent because I don't have a credit rating and they cannot threaten me with credit damage. I almost WANT them to threaten me with punishment that includes incarceration because (aside from the free food and rent) being arrested would lead to a trial, which might lead to a legal precedent in Canada in which a fucking greedy corporation like Telus was punished for making their contract too hard to cancel. It actually happened to me once long ago. I was threatened with arrest by a collector working for a gym membership that was doing something similar. Maybe I should have gone to court and maybe I would have won and it would now be harder for companies to employ the Iliad Flow. SOMEbody has to start the dominos falling. It looks like we're already behind the US for crying out loud!
I am appalled. What do YOU reckon?
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