GATINEAU – The third day of the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunication Services (CCTS) mandate review saw telecom providers in the West and East agree on a few changes to the complaints body. Quebecor Media and Shaw Communications noted in their respective testimony to the CRTC on Thursday they believe it’s natural for the CCTS to conduct some code interpretation.
They also believe that participation in the complaints body should be mandatory.
Peggy Tabet, senior director of regulatory affairs for telecommunications at Quebecor, noted under questioning that it’s about treating all players equally. In a world where the company is subjected to a variety of codes, all players should participate in the CCTS in order to have a level playing field, she said in French. Tabet added that Quebecor understands that there may be problems getting the smallest providers to fall under the CCTS and agreed with the complaints body that perhaps the CRTC could facilitate some of this activity.
Shaw’s decision to support mandatory participation is actually a reversal of opinion. The company has long advocated for voluntary participation, but said during its testimony that it recognized the difficulties CCTS was having, in some cases, in getting companies to deal with complaints.
“To be quite frank, we viewed it as a competitive advantage, to say we belong to the CCTS, kind of like belonging to the Better Business Bureau or another organization that gives you a stamp of approval,” said Morgan Elliott, senior VP of regulatory affairs at Shaw, in response to a question from Peter Menzies, vice-chair of telecommunications. “But we’ve heard some of the concerns that the CCTS has in terms of getting people involved, some of the mandates, so if it’s easier for them to include everyone, if it’s easier to get things done, then we can entirely be reasonable on this.”
Quebecor and Shaw also agreed that code interpretations seem to be a normal activity and natural function for the CCTS.
Yanick Boily, director of regulatory affairs for telecommunications at Quebecor, noted that no text or code is perfect and that there will always be grey areas and ambiguities. On that basis, he said, it’s normal for the CCTS to do a certain level of interpretation and that it’s “illusory” to think that the CCTS can only just manage complaints and apply the code in “a robotic manner.”
But, Boily added, it’s important that CCTS doesn’t go too far and get into interpreting policy. As long as the complaints body doesn’t cross that line, then Quebecor is fine with limited interpretation.
Shaw agreed with Quebecor that some interpretation is necessary for the CCTS to do its job.
“I think a reasonable person would say there has to be some sort of interpretation of what’s there, otherwise you can’t make a decision,” Elliott said. “I think they have to have the flexibility to interpret what’s there to make a fair decision. But if a service provider was not agreeable to what was being done and believed they were going above and beyond in interpreting or creating new policies, I think there’s avenues for us that we could pursue that don’t penalize the consumer in terms of coming back directly to the CRTC through a Part 1 or another proceeding.”
“Right now, many of our customers believe that the CCTS is largely useless because it does not provide timely resolution to a Rogers or Bell or Shaw or Telus or Videotron installer’s failure to show up.” – Bram Abramson, Teksavvy
Teksavvy Solutions rounded out the testimony on Thursday, arguing that the CCTS should have the ability to require information and documents from third party participating service providers when investigating complaints. For example, there must be rules against wholesale network providers offering next-day service to affiliated customers yet next-month service to independent retailers like Teksavvy that rely on incumbent infrastructure.
“Right now, many of our customers believe that the CCTS is largely useless because it does not provide timely resolution to a Rogers or Bell or Shaw or Telus or Videotron installer’s failure to show up,” said Bram Abramson, chief legal and regulatory officer at Teksavvy. The CCTS should be a place where a wide variety of retail, consumer and service delivery problems are resolved in a timely and informal manner, he added.
“That is part of the CCTS’s first core mandate: to act, respectfully, as a gap filler,” said Abramson.
Under questioning, Teksavvy reiterated that it doesn’t believe the CCTS’s mandate should be expanded but rather it should be given additional tools to more effectively study customer complaints and then come to a solution.
“We think the mandate is clear,” Abramson said, adding if the CCTS was able to gather all the facts then it would be able to address more consumer complaints and resolve them more efficiently. For example, the CRTC can seek information from third parties in its investigations and giving the CCTS that same authority would lead to more efficient dispute resolution.
The complaints body’s mandate review wraps up on Friday with Bell Canada and the reply from the CCTS being the major appearances.
