Usage-Based+Billing+(pertaining+to+Canada)

In May 2010, the Canadian Radio-Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) approved metered internet usage, called usage-based billing, for Canada's largest Internet service providers. To elaborate, the CRTC ruling allows major Internet service providers (ISPs) like Bell Canada to charge its customers based on the amount of bandwidth they use, and it also allows providers to implement a cap on how much data consumers can utilize.

In turn, smaller ISPs are forced to switch from unlimited access plans to usage-based billing because they purchase bandwidth from Bell Canada to resell to their customers; they run the risk of having to pay additional fees (of more than $1 per GB). Bell Canada wants to charge Canadians more money and give less bandwidth, but independent companies want to charge less and give unlimited bandwidth. Bell Canada got the CRTC to make that impossible. For example, people receiving Internet from TekSavvy in Ontario are now cut off from unlimited access, and they have to choose between two packages: Lite, which has as little as 2GB of usage going for around $25-30, and Premium, which allows 25GB for $30-40 (the range in is due to the insurance option, which allows some breathing room by giving a little extra bandwidth should the user go over the base amount of usage). Additionally, unused data at the end of the month does not roll over into the next month. [2] For comparison, in the United States, Comcast's monthly data usage threshold is 250GB per month per account for all residential customers. To put 250GB into perspective, Comcast states that “a customer would have to do any one of the following: send 50 million emails (at 0.05 KB/email), download 62,500 songs (at 4 MB/song), download 125 standard-definition movies (at 2 GB/movie) [or] upload 25,000 hi-resolution digital photos (at 10 MB/photo).” [2]

The Canadian government is looking to overturn the CRTC's ruling by forcing them to review their decision, since not only affects the daily user, but businesses and schools too. Consumers and businesses have already flooded government officials with thousands of complaints. [3]

What this essentially means is higher bills for heavy users, and major ISPs are rolling in that money. Canadians can say goodbye to gaming and streaming HD television shows and movies. Netflix, which had just recently expanded into Canada, is essentially useless, since it can eat through between one or two gigabytes and hour, depending on the quality of the video.

Consumers receiving Internet from Rogers get to see this when they're close to reaching their alloted bandwidth limits. http://thedailywh.at/post/3069132093/psa-of-the-day-as-egypt-starts-to-recover-from-a

[1] http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/01/canada-gets-first-bitter-dose-of-metered-internet-billing.ars

[2] http://www.comcast.net/terms/network/amendment/

[3] http://www.suite101.com/content/canada-to-pay-more-for-internet-with-internet-caps-on-useage-a341540

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