The Competition Bureau says it’s suing Rogers Communications Inc. over the company’s allegedly false claim that it offers unlimited data in its “Infinite” wireless phone plans.
The bureau alleged Monday that Rogers’ ads create the false or misleading impression that the plans provide consumers with limitless data, when in reality data service is severely throttled once a data cap is reached. It says data speeds are reduced, or throttled, by over 99 percent once a customer hits the cap.
“Canadians need accurate and truthful information when purchasing goods and services, especially essential services like wireless data plans,” said Competition commissioner Matthew Boswell in a statement.
Rogers says in a statement that the advertising of its Infinite plans is clear and truthful, and it will fight the litigation.
It says the plans introduced in 2019 helped eliminate overage fees at a time when data use started growing exponentially. It said such plans are commonplace in the industry and the bureau’s decision to single out Rogers after five years is quite concerning.
Other telecom companies also advertise plans with “unlimited” data at reduced speeds once a threshold is reached. Bell Canada notes directly in the advertised rates on its website that speeds are reduced to “up to” 512K kilobits per second after the threshold, while Rogers and others put the actual speed for unlimited data in the footnotes.
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The bureau says it has filed an application with the Competition Tribunal to have Rogers stop the misleading advertising, pay a penalty, and issue restitution to Infinite wireless phone plan customers.
The legal action comes a little over a year after the Competition Bureau obtained a court order requiring Rogers to produce records and information relevant to the investigation.
As part of an earlier legal response to the bureau, Rogers noted that from a practical perspective, Infinite customers get access to high speed mobile data in such significant quantities that it is effectively unlimited for their purposes.
The current plans on the Rogers website advertise either 175 gigabytes or 200GB before speeds are reduced. The CRTC said that as of the second quarter of this year, Canadians used an average of 9.27GB of data per month on their mobile devices.
