Reforms to the CCTS telecom complaints body should benefit customers

TV customers to benefit from a clearer, more effective complaints resolution process.

Telecom customers across Canada should benefit as a result of proposed reforms to the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services (CCTS). The reforms — set out this morning by the CRTC — will benefit Canadians who have experienced mistreatment at the hands of their Internet, cell phone, or television provider.

The key reforms proposed this morning include expanding the CCTS mandate to encompass all TV service providers for the first time, along with measures to boost public awareness of the CCTS and its complaints process, and to make public more information relating to CCTS governance and operations.

Canadians have long suffered mistreatment at the hands of Big Telecom, and these common sense steps should help level the playing field. The recent mean-spirited implementation of new TV Pick-and-Pay rules remind us that the telecom giants will take any opportunity they can to price-gouge and squeeze Canadians. That’s why a speedy and effective complaints process is so important.

Last year the CCTS processed over 10,000 complaints from Internet and cellphone customers. It also received over 7,000 complaints from TV customers, which it was unable to process given that TV was out of scope for the organization at the time. Canadians can submit a complaint to the CCTS at: https://www.ccts-cprst.ca/complaints/complaint-form