Need advice - Telus sold my girlfriend mobile internet for home with 3 yr contract.

**Jonny K** · 08-13-2012, 11:43 PM

Hi,

In the past this forum helped me solve an unrelated dispute so I have high hopes that I can get some good information here to help my girlfriend. I'll keep the story short.

The girlfriend moved into her first apartment and called Telus to order high speed internet. When she asked the guy on the phone for "High Speed Internet" he told her that instead he would tell her what is best for her to get. Since my girlfriend doesn't know much about computers (I've learned) she plays along. He asks if she has a laptop, and she says yes. He then proceeds to recommend to her the Telus Mobility product "Data 35" which is a mobile puck thing. He told her than she gets 2 GB per month data usage, but of course she didn't know what that meant. He assured her that it's hard to use that much data. What he neglected to understand (or ignored) was the fact that she used her laptop as a home desktop. So, she signs a 3 year contract...

Then she gets her first bill recently. The bill was for $485.53, the majority of it being data overcharges. This is the point where I came into the story and discovered that the Telus guy had locked her in to a 3 year contract for something that totally won't work for her.

So, she calls Telus again. She was always polite, and speaks to several people on the phone asking them to switch her off the Data 35 and put her on regular home based High Speed Internet, and to credit her bill for the crazy charge due to the mistake (or malevolence) of the Telus guy. It doesn't seem fair to us to be misled into buying the wrong thing and then charged obscenely for it. The response from Telus was that the best they would do is cut 50% from the bill, but they would not allow her to change her internet since she was on a contract. To get out of the contract they would charge her another $187. Since there's no way this internet will ever work for her, that means she has to pay $187 + $243 = $430 just to get out. That doesn't seem fair to us.

Is there anything we can do, short of going to court? And if we go to court, is it even worth it? I believe the original call where the Telus guy misled her should be recorded.

Thanks for your help,

Jonny K

**WorldIRC** · 08-13-2012, 11:50 PM

Just wondering; on what basis would you be going to court for?

**B407** · 08-14-2012, 12:32 AM

Going to court would be a waste of time and money.

Keep escalating this and see if they'll credit you back for more. If they don't agree then pay the ECF and get out and take your business to Shaw.

**turbogeek** · 08-14-2012, 12:32 AM

What I'm most confused about is why paying $485.53 and switching services would have been an acceptable resolution, but paying $430 to be free and clear is not. I'm not making a judgement either way on the story, but that part just doesn't make sense.

**intlbizman** · 08-14-2012, 12:53 AM

in my opinion $435 is what you need to pay. its nof entirely telus's fault that you don't know what mobile internet vs home internet is. and it's definitely not Telus's fault that you went over 2GB.

having realized the mistake of being on the wrong plan, I think they should allow you to switch to a 3yr home internet contract.

with all this said, what they've offered you puts you in a better situation than what I've outlined so you should take the deal.

ur gf needs to know she is a big girl now and needs to be responsible in her actions and decisions. if she doesnt know what she is doing, she shouldn't trust herself to make her own decisions.

**nzoka** · 08-14-2012, 01:00 AM

Did Telus give her a free USB stick or did she purchase it ?

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**cricketfan** · 08-14-2012, 01:09 AM

Originally Posted by intlbizman

ur gf needs to know she is a big girl now and needs to be responsible in her actions and decisions. if she doesnt know what she is doing, she shouldn't trust herself to make her own decisions.

Ooh, that's gonna burn.

What I find shady is why or how did the csr came to this conclusion that 2 GB would be right for her without knowing her usage habits.
In this age of time, even smart phones arebundled with 6GB to make it bear able and we are talking about laptop here.

Sent from my LG-P999

**B407** · 08-14-2012, 01:17 AM

Originally Posted by cricketfan

Ooh, that's gonna burn.

What I find shady is why or how did the csr came to this conclusion that 2 GB would be right for her without knowing her usage habits.
In this age of time, even smart phones arebundled with 6GB to make it bear able and we are talking about laptop here.

Sent from my LG-P999

Although it wasn't mentioned by the OP, it is a very basic sales skill to ask your customer how they will be using the service. Since the OP mentioned her girlfriend is not tech savvy she could have responded with something along the lines of, "oh just basic stuff, I don't really use my computer that much". In which case, it would be right to recommend a 2GB plan.

**xtachx** · 08-14-2012, 01:22 AM

I have a hard time believing that your gf didnt know the difference between a data stick and home internet? In 2012 ?

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**intlbizman** · 08-14-2012, 01:31 AM

Originally Posted by cricketfan

Ooh, that's gonna burn.

sorry i wasn't trying to "burn"... but it's just logical fact that if you don't know what you're doing, you shouldn't do it...?

**Logical_guy** · 08-14-2012, 01:35 AM

I'm surprised nobody has pointed out one key thing:

Telus Home Services and Telus Mobility are actually separate entities.
When the OP's gf called into Telus asking about Internet, the only way she would have been offered a Mobile Internet Device is if she called into Telus Mobility in the first place.

She would not have been able to get High speed at home through the rep she spoke to, and this is why the rep steered the conversation towards mobile internet.

That is precisely why the solution offered was even considered, and also why switching over from her current situation to Home Services is not possible.

Rogers can lump home services and wireless together, Telus cannot.

While it's unfortunate that she is in this position, it is a case of buyer beware, where she signed on to a certain plan and service not knowing the full details.

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**OCZ** · 08-14-2012, 01:35 AM

Originally Posted by B407

Although it wasn't mentioned by the OP, it is a very basic sales skill to ask your customer how they will be using the service. Since the OP mentioned her girlfriend is not tech savvy she could have responded with something along the lines of, "oh just basic stuff, I don't really use my computer that much". In which case, it would be right to recommend a 2GB plan.

I also might believe such a response from the gf ... because basic surfing is ok for 2GB kinda really but she should have told him more details about her internet habits ...

**Que_Ball** · 08-14-2012, 06:10 AM

The cancellation fee would include the subsidized cost of the device. Selling that "puck" gets some of that money back since it still has value.

The overusage fees might have had warnings though it's harder to notice them on an internet stick since it shows up only in the dialling program as a little envelope that launches a separate SMS program. But Telus would have sent text messages with warnings at 75% usage, 95% usage, $10 overusage and $50 overusage.

In this situation they could be offering to change your rate plan to something more appropriate and credit the difference on what it would have cost on the better plan. So if a flex plan that goes up to 9GB would have only cost $90 for the month they should offer to switch you to that plan and credit the difference on the past month as long as it wasn't roaming data outside of Canada.

Of course the big advantage to a mobile data plan is the mobility and being able to take the laptop out of the house and still have internet access. That might have been the selling point that the girlfriend bought into. Another possibility is that there is no Telus high speed ADSL service at that address so the mobile high speed was offered as an alternative to the traditional fixed high speed. (small possibility these days but still may be the case)

As someone else mentioned, Telus runs their mobility division pretty much as a completely separate company. They are slowly moving in a direction that seems to integrate the two more in the future but it's definitely not happening quickly. They do have some ability for the regular landline sales reps to sell mobility products but it's rather limited and they usually just transfer the call to the mobility line when someone asks about a mobile product.

**DennyCrane** · 08-14-2012, 02:10 PM

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry Bold 9900: Mozilla/5.0 (BlackBerry; U; BlackBerry 9900; en) AppleWebKit/534.11+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/7.1.0.391 Mobile Safari/534.11+)

Without knowing the whole story, it sounds as though the sales agent took advantage of her lack of knowledge as well as her negligence. Pretty shady business practice if you ask me.

The situation is definitely unfortunate. I'd tell them to cancel the line immediately, pay the penalty, sell the internet stick, and find another internet service provider. TELUS doesn't deserve your business after that stunt. See if the offer changes after telling them all that. If not, take the 50% off and leave. Ultimately she is still responsible for it. Good luck!

**Jonny K** · 08-15-2012, 03:21 AM

Thanks for all the input guys. I don't know if I have the full story because I'm acting as the middle man here, but I sent this thread to the GF to read and she's concluded that she'll just have to buy her way out as we'd feared. She did tell me that she got a notice that her data use was over and stopped using the internet when she got it, but then how did she manage to go so far past? Was the warning late? Did she not notice on time? I don't know exactly. I think she was at least 20 gigs over her 2 gig limit, which probably isn't something she would do if she had indeed gotten 4 warning text messages about over use.

All Telus would offer was to change her mobile plan to the more expensive $90 plan that gives a little more data, but that still isn't useful, she needs a home connection. One interesting thing we noticed is that when we first called them and asked about getting a credit on the bill they wouldn't move much, only trying to sell her an alternate data plan (for about 30 minutes). We persisted that we didn't want an alternate plan and eventually they offered a 25% discount. We declined the discount and still requested a full credit for the bill. They came back again and this time offered the 50% discount. We told them we still wanted a full refund and would not accept their deal just yet, saying we'd call back in a few days after consulting some people (you guys). After the call the GF checked the account and found they had already applied the 50% discount to it. It's like they're dangling a carrot to try and get her to accept the bill. She's going to call again tomorrow, hopefully they'll knock more off, but I don't know.

Thanks for the help.

Jonny K