New Pay As You Go Maximum Balance

[lmcjipo]

Had my prepaid phone off during the holidays and just turned it on today to receive the following text from Rogers:

Rogers service msg: Starting at the end of 2018, our prepaid services will have a maximum allowed balance of $150. Any balance above $150 will no longer be available as of end of 2018. We will be in touch with more information on how you can use your balance soon, but in the meantime you can continue to use your balance as normal. Questions? http://rogers.com/contactus

What are the options? The option that I think that they will do is to force those high balance users to go to postpaid. Unless they give me the option to get a new phone, there is no way that I would be able to use my balance or reduce it to under $150 before the end of 2018. The only other thing which would reduce my balance is for me to take options/services that I don't need (like data/SMS/addon services) that I don't need for the sake of just reducing my balance.

This seems ridiculous.

***EDITED LABELS***

[strawberry1]

I am very upset by this proposed theft!  Global News is interested in Go Public.  Contact them.

CRTS/CCTS are not helpful because Rogers can set its terms.  But theft is theft.  In my case, over $400.

[lmcjipo]

In terms of Rogers setting its terms, the complaints shown in: https://www.ccts-cprst.ca/for-consumers/complaints/decisions/ show that the CCTS has come up with decisions against Rogers as well as other carriers.

[lmcjipo]

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@lmcjipo wrote:

In terms of Rogers setting its terms, the complaints shown in: https://www.ccts-cprst.ca/for-consumers/complaints/decisions/ show that the CCTS has come up with decisions against Rogers as well as other carriers.

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I'm just quoting my previous comment to say that I was actually contacted today regarding my complaint and after a ~68 minute call where there was what I would term polite/heated arguing/disagreement, I got what I considered to be a fair offer for both Rogers and I.

In the conversation, she mentioned that instead of topping up, I could have used $100 of the prepaid balance that I already had in my account during the various years to extend the expiration date instead of always topping up $100 per year so my balance would not be as high as it was. I told her that I followed all rules regarding their Pay As Yo Go service of topping up the balance and having it rollover BEFORE the expiration date and I challenged her to show me where it stated that I could use my existing airtime balance to extend it by a year and even when checking the balance using *225, it never stated anything about using an existing $100 airtime balance to extend the expiration date by 1 year. As mentioned in my earlier posts, my balance was SIGNIFICANTLY over $150

At the end, she seemed to offer me a refund of the entire amount after I switched to postpaid (so I'm not sure if this would/can be offered). She asked me if that was what I wanted. I told her that if she was prepared to allow me to port my number to a different carrier AND refund my balance, I would accept that since I didn't want to lose my balance when I ported my number. She placed me on hold and when she got back to me, she offered me what I had suggested/mentioned in my complaint.

My suggestion is to stand firm and be polite... If what you are asking for under their new guidelines of $150 maximum going foward is fair, you might be able to get it.

[OLDYELLR]

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@lmcjipo wrote:

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@lmcjipo wrote:

In terms of Rogers setting its terms, the complaints shown in: https://www.ccts-cprst.ca/for-consumers/complaints/decisions/ show that the CCTS has come up with decisions against Rogers as well as other carriers.

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I'm just quoting my previous comment to say that I was actually contacted today regarding my complaint and after a ~68 minute call where there was what I would term polite/heated arguing/disagreement, I got what I considered to be a fair offer for both Rogers and I.

In the conversation, she mentioned that instead of topping up, I could have used $100 of the prepaid balance that I already had in my account during the various years to extend the expiration date instead of always topping up $100 per year so my balance would not be as high as it was. I told her that I followed all rules regarding their Pay As Yo Go service of topping up the balance and having it rollover BEFORE the expiration date and I challenged her to show me where it stated that I could use my existing airtime balance to extend it by a year and even when checking the balance using *225, it never stated anything about using an existing $100 airtime balance to extend the expiration date by 1 year. As mentioned in my earlier posts, my balance was SIGNIFICANTLY over $150

At the end, she seemed to offer me a refund of the entire amount after I switched to postpaid (so I'm not sure if this would/can be offered). She asked me if that was what I wanted. I told her that if she was prepared to allow me to port my number to a different carrier AND refund my balance, I would accept that since I didn't want to lose my balance when I ported my number. She placed me on hold and when she got back to me, she offered me what I had suggested/mentioned in my complaint.

My suggestion is to stand firm and be polite... If what you are asking for under their new guidelines of $150 maximum going foward is fair, you might be able to get it.

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That's what I do and would have done. But Rogers does not state anywhere you can do that. There is no mechanism to do that on-line, only to top up another $100. The only way I knew was through a letter from Rogers years ago, as I mentioned earlier.  At least she let you use your large accumulated balance towards a a postpaid plan, if that's what you really wanted. But if you weren't using $100 worth of air time in a year, you'll just be getting the same thing for a lot more money.

[lmcjipo]

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@OLDYELLR wrote:

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That's what I do and would have done. But Rogers does not state anywhere you can do that. There is no mechanism to do that on-line, only to top up another $100. The only way I knew was through a letter from Rogers years ago, as I mentioned earlier.  At least she let you use your large accumulated balance towards a a postpaid plan, if that's what you really wanted. But if you weren't using $100 worth of air time in a year, you'll just be getting the same thing for a lot more money.

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I actually wanted to clarify. I filled out the CCTS form and also filled out the Rogers Share A Concern form and it was actually Rogers Office of the President that contacted me yesterday. I received an e-mail from CCTS to clarify my issue (they had a webform which had a limited number of characters to type so I couldn't explain it properly).

In CCTS's e-mail to me, when they asked me to clarify my issue, they mentioned that "If Rogers has changed your terms without your consent, this issue falls into their mandate"

In any event, as I mentioned to the Rogers person working at the Office of the President yesterday after a heated 68 minute "discussion", I consider my issue resolved when I got what I wanted given the fact that I had to accept the $150 maximum going forward.

I went postpaid to use up my balance beyond the December 2018 date since my balance as mentioned was significantly over $150. I will just use my mobile phone for everything going forward even when I'm near a landline phone (like at work or at home) from now on as opposed to when I was on Pay As You Go (and paying for every single minute), I was only using the phone very sparingly. I've already used 80 minutes this month and my billing date is the 1st of the month (~63 minutes of that was when Rogers Office of the President called me yesterday).

Anyone upset with the $150 maximum, my suggestion is don't give up and try lodging your issue both on the "Share A Concern" website AND the CCTS website. I'm not 100% satisfied but given the new $150 maximum, I feel that I got the best that I could get on postpaid so I am satisfied.

[gerrymacd]

Having had a credit balance since I have had pay as you go I would regard the confiscation of their deemed excess as fraud and theft!

It would seem to me that pay as you go customers have entered a contract to roll over the unused credit.

If Rogers wishes to change the terms of the contract, that may be their prerogative, but any funds accrued under the old plan should be refundable in full! One should not be forced to use the balance to buy unneeded services or face confiscation of what is their money!

It would be interesting to seek an opinion on the legality of this plan from the CRTC

[barndoor]

This whole issue has me shaking my head in wonder .  From the Rogers standpoint  what is the point ? It is all positive to let people keep their balances.... and no negatives to Rogers really . 

From the other side of the coin  ,... what is everyone with a high balance going to do with it ?  It's  NOT cash in the bank ...it had to be paid  to access the system  ... you can't just have it back as cash .... it needs to be used for Rogers product of some kind .  If you have a balance of  over $400 even $300 ... before this happened , just what  Rogers product were you going to purchase ??  Colour me confused . 

[OLDYELLR]

It shouldn't matter to Rogers and customers with a high balance are just wasting their money by not drawing from it to renew. Here is what I think. People upset over getting their balance capped at $150 call Rogers for help. Rogers lets them use their balance to migrate to a more expensive postpaid plan. Rogers wins in the long run.

[strawberry1]

Rogers needs to provide better options like refunds and good will gestures.  Last year, I gave Rogers $100 and got network time and a new updated expiry date.  It is not okay to give them $100 of a balance without network time; and only a new expiry date.  Post paid is very expensive.  'Theft' by any name is not a choice.   Contact Global TV or Toronto Star, consumer protection person.  We need more options.

[barndoor]

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@strawberry1 wrote:

 It is not okay to give them $100 of a balance without network time; and only a new expiry date. 

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Why ?  Doing it that way effectively reduces the cost of your plan from an average of $8.33 per month to  about $5.75 per month depending on how little you use your phone . How is that not a good will gesture to those with larger balances ? 

[strawberry1]

Now, you give them $100.  You get an new expiry date.  Before now, you give them $100.  You get a new expiry date and more time.  Which is better?

[OLDYELLR]

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@strawberry1 wrote:

Now, you give them $100.  You get an new expiry date.  Before now, you give them $100.  You get a new expiry date and more time.  Which is better?

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Those are different plans. The $100/year one which gave you $100 balance to use and let you roll the remainder over when you renew the next year is no longer offered. It was posted here earlier that people with that plan would be migrated over to a $10/month Talk/Text plan unless they called to get grandfathered before March 2018. If you originally had that plan and switched, maybe you can't get it back because it's now gone.   Of course the old plan is better if you're an infrequent user.  When I called to get grandfathered, the agent agreed and said I was doing the smart thing.

[barndoor]

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@strawberry1 wrote:

Now, you give them $100.  You get an new expiry date.  Before now, you give them $100.  You get a new expiry date and more time.  Which is better?

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This is the way I see it.  Over the years you have paid $100 a year  for calltime and system access.  The balance they let you carry forward is calltime credit . I can't imagine them letting you  take that  out as cash ...it is for  calltime. 

 If you can take $100  of that calltime  credit and pay for another years   worth of system access  I'd say that is far better even though you get no extra calltime.  It lets you use your calltime credit (which you have already paid the tax on ) instead of  paying tax on another $100  to get basically the same thing.   

While it may indeed be theft  to   eliminate some of  your calltime credits the way Rogers is  threatening,  at least they are offering  to keep the plan going  if you ask and  letting you use your balance to renew .  

For the $120 / yr  plan ...Rogers supposedly gave notice and apparently everyone  got bumped to $180/yr to renew  take it or leave it  . 

[lmcjipo]

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@barndoor wrote:

This whole issue has me shaking my head in wonder .  From the Rogers standpoint  what is the point ? It is all positive to let people keep their balances.... and no negatives to Rogers really . 

From the other side of the coin  ,... what is everyone with a high balance going to do with it ?  It's  NOT cash in the bank ...it had to be paid  to access the system  ... you can't just have it back as cash .... it needs to be used for Rogers product of some kind .  If you have a balance of  over $400 even $300 ... before this happened , just what  Rogers product were you going to purchase ??  Colour me confused . 

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I agree with you that the high balance doesn't affect Rogers in the least and is actually beneficial to Rogers since it keeps people from porting their numbers to a different carrier. My high balance was the one thing keeping me from jumping to a different carrier when Rogers, Bell, and Telus started to charge for incoming SMS as they made it inconvenient for me as someone who doesn't use SMS at all (and Rogers Pay As You go not being able to stop SMS charges on a Pay As You Go account) to be charged when getting spam and having to call in every time I wanted to get credit for the spam that I received where depending on the CSR some of them would "argue" a bit more about it or would say "we will investigate it before giving you the credit".

Rogers gets to keep the customer... the customer will keep topping up with $100. They get this $100 interest free. They charge a somewhat high per minute rate per call ($0.50/minute is quite high). Eventually the customer will not top up in time and lose all his/her balance guaranteed.

For me, I had my high balance in order to use it when the need might come up. Most months, I used under $7 which would be ~14 minutes. If one month I talked for over 60 minutes (and it has happened), that would be ~$30. They don't let you use the balance for anything other than talk time and 911 fees. It was never stated anywhere that people could use/spend $100 of their existing to extend their expiration date by one year nor was any maximum balance stated until they sent the SMS late last year. They decided to go with a very low (in my opinion) airtime balance maximum. They should have gone with a maximum balance of $500 initially (even then I would still be over their maximum) and then brought it down slowly instead of going for a low $150 initially.

[OLDYELLR]

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@lmcjipo wrote:

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 Rogers, Bell, and Telus started to charge for incoming SMS as they made it inconvenient for me as someone who doesn't use SMS at all (and Rogers Pay As You go not being able to stop SMS charges on a Pay As You Go account) to be charged when getting spam and having to call in every time I wanted to get credit for the spam that I received where depending on the CSR some of them would "argue" a bit more about it or would say "we will investigate it before giving you the credit".

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Off topic in this thread, but when I receive spam SMS I forward it to 7726 and most of the time don't get charged for it. My time is too valuable to wait on the phone and argue with a CSR over $0.30.

[barndoor]

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lmcjipo wrote: For me, I had my high balance in order to use it when the need might come up. Most months, I used under $7 which would be ~14 minutes. If one month I talked for over 60 minutes (and it has happened), that would be ~$30. They don't let you use the balance for anything other than talk time and 911 fees. It was never stated anywhere that people could use/spend $100 of their existing to extend their expiration date by one year nor was any maximum balance stated until they sent the SMS late last year. They decided to go with a very low (in my opinion) airtime balance maximum. They should have gone with a maximum balance of $500 initially (even then I would still be over their maximum) and then brought it down slowly instead of going for a low $150 initially.

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 I see.  I guess my issue was I've never trusted Rogers after several issues during our time here,  so  I didn't want a high balance and looked for ways to keep it down . 

There ARE other things you can use the balance for . We have a text add on ( I understand that is no use to you if you don't use text).  I would expect that you could put balance toward the data add on's as well   if that was something you would use. 

No where can I find in any discussions  where Rogers notified users with a general notification  that they could roll balance over to pay for another year of system access .    For that reason I think  they  should back off on their balance confiscation  and give people a more reasonable time frame to use up their balance.  After all  it was Rogers that allowed it to be built up to such levels  over years ( balances  have taken several years to accrue to these levels, not just 14 months like they are using as a target in which to take it away, 75 %  in some cases) , with no communication  as to how to reduce it . 

[OLDYELLR]

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@barndoor wrote:

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No where can I find in any discussions  where Rogers notified users with a general notification  that they could roll balance over to pay for another year of system access .    For that reason I think  they  should back off on their balance confiscation  and give people a more reasonable time frame to use up their balance.  After all  it was Rogers that allowed it to be built up to such levels  over years ( balances  have taken several years to accrue to these levels, not just 14 months like they are using as a target in which to take it away, 75 %  in some cases) , with no communication  as to how to reduce it . 

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That's exactly right. I first learned I could use my excess balance to renew years ago when I received a letter from Rogers.  Nowhere on the website could I find that information. You certainly won't find it now when the original plan is no longer offered.  Instead of sending out text about the upcoming balance cap (did everyone get this?) there ought to be a FAQ on the website with details what to do about a mounting balance that would never be used.

[57]

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@barndoor wrote:

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No where can I find in any discussions  where Rogers notified users with a general notification  that they could roll balance over to pay for another year of system access .   

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Just as an FYI, Using $100 of your balance was discussed over on Digital Home's website (Rogers PAYGo thread) around 2013. I received an e-mail on the topic then and have used that feature three times since then.  I can't link that thread right now, but it should be easy to find.  You're right that not many people are aware of the "feature".

[strawberry1]

I have a substantial balance on my pay go service.  I contacted the media and was immediately put in touch with the president's office.  A rep there promised to refund the balance above $150 and extended the expiry date.  Contact the media or escalate the situation to the president's office.  They should help anyone who will lose a balance at the end of 2018.  Please pass this info on to everyone.  OLDYELLR are you there?

[OLDYELLR]

@strawberry1 If Rogers will refund your excessive balance, then they should do it for everyone who asks. After all, it's not the customer's fault such a balance builds up when Rogers never made it very clear how to deal with it, such as drawing from it to renew.  Some of us knew, but not everyone. It's very clear how to renew or top up on line, but you can only do it by credit card, not from your balance, even if you have hundreds of dollars accumulated.

[barndoor]

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@strawberry1 wrote:

I have a substantial balance on my pay go service.  I contacted the media and was immediately put in touch with the president's office.  A rep there promised to refund the balance above $150 and extended the expiry date. 

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Congratulations ...  good deal  !! 

I hope you had them send you a written confirmation  of doing that for you .  11 1/2 months is a long time .