CRTC declines to fine Northwestel in dispute with Iristel

The CRTC has found there is no need to fine BCE Inc. subsidiary Northwestel for disconnecting Iristel Inc.’s voice telecommunications services for nearly 24 hours in a dispute over bill payments. Iristel was looking for an administrative monetary penalty to be placed on Northwestel, but the CRTC found in a decision released Friday, Sept. 19 that it did not violate the rules. The dispute goes back to 2023, when Iristel began fighting with Bell and Northwestel over payment for its services. In September 2023, the two companies gave Iristel notice that they would disconnect its service in 30 days. Iristel had gone to the CRTC to have the notices withdrawn, but in June 2024, the CRTC declined to do so. It told Iristel to pay the overdue funds or negotiate a payment plan. A day after that decision, Northwestel sent Iristel a new notice of disconnection, giving it deadlines to pay the full amount due or go into a deferred payment agreement, or face all of its services being disconnected. In early August of that year, Northwestel followed through and disconnected Iristel’s service, only to reconnect them the next day after Iristel entered a deferred payment agreement. In its Part 1 application to the CRTC filed last August, Iristel alleged that Northwestel demanded it sign a deferred payment agreement to stop it from disconnecting Iristel’s service, but then cut it anyway after receiving Iristel’s signed copy. In the days following the back-and-forth over disconnection and reconnection, Iristel asked the CRTC for the order finding Northwestel was wrong to disconnect Iristel’s service because it was ready to enter the agreement, and that it was wrong to disconnect Iristel and charge it late payment fees. It wanted Northwestel to face an administrative monetary penalty for the moves. READ MORE: - Iristel arguments in interconnection fight with Bell, Northwestel dismissed again by CRTC - Iristel asks CRTC to penalize Northwestel for disconnection in billing dispute - Bell, Northwestel tell CRTC to leave billing dispute with Iristel in hands of the court But the CRTC has again found that Northwestel was not in the wrong for acting how it did. Iristel had been holding back the payments because of the violations it alleged Northwestel committed. “Northwestel submitted that it had no reason to believe Iristel was prepared to enter into and honour a reasonable deferred payment agreement. According to Northwestel, it made every effort to negotiate with Iristel, including consistently proposing reasonable deferred payment agreements, repeatedly extending the deadline for payment or a deferred payment agreement, and agreeing to meet on a statutory holiday, at Iristel’s request, to facilitate the signing of a deferred payment agreement,” the CRTC wrote in its decision. “Northwestel alleged that, despite these efforts, Iristel failed to meet any of the deadlines, rendering all deferred payment agreements null and void.” The CRTC notes that records show Iristel did not start negotiating with Northwestel on a deferred payment agreement until the last days of the notice period it was given, and that Northwestel provided correspondence between the two sides showing that it “repeatedly” extended the deadline for Iristel to pay or enter an agreement, “and that Iristel either refused or failed to do so,” as well as meeting with Iristel the day before disconnection was to occur to work out a deferred payment plan, “but no agreement was concluded.” The day after disconnection, Iristel gave Northwestel a signed copy of the deferred payment agreement “with significant amendments including to the amounts it was to pay Northwestel. “The commission considers that Iristel’s extensive amendments to Northwestel’s original agreement, coupled with Iristel’s failure to enter into a deferred payment agreement by the deadline, indicate that Northwestel had reasonable grounds to conclude that Iristel was not prepared to enter into or honour a reasonable deferred payment agreement at the time services were disconnected,” the CRTC wrote. It noted that Iristel did not dispute the amount of money it was said to owe as part of its application to the CRTC. Iristel CEO Samer Bishay told The Wire Report in an email Friday that “this decision shows how far the CRTC has drifted from its mandate to protect competition and the public interest. “When commissioners like Claire Anderson and Bram Abramson themselves expressed concerns in earlier rulings about fairness and proportionality, it’s clear there is ‘substantial doubt’ about the commission’s direction.” Northwestel did not respond to a request for comment Friday. The two commissioners had raised dissenting opinions on the CRTC decision released earlier this year. Anderson disagreed with the CRTC’s conclusion that it would have been wrong for the commission to ask for more information to “improve” the Iristel application, while Abramson wrote that while he ultimately agreed with the decision, he had concerns about how the regulator approached the June 2024 decision and how it dismissed Iristel’s review and vary application. news@thewirereport.ca

CRTC declines to fine Northwestel in dispute with Iristel

Regulatory |
By Wire Report Staff
|September 19, 2025

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CRTC declines to fine Northwestel in dispute with Iristel

Regulatory | By Wire Report Staff |September 19, 2025

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By Wire Report Staff
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