The CRTC presented its public opinion research (POR) research on telecommunication services in the Far North so late in its ongoing consultation process that BCE Inc. 's...
There is a consensus forming that the CRTC should open up BCE Inc.'s Northwestel to competition through mandated wholesale access, and that mandated wholesale access is the...
The CRTC approved an application by BCE Inc.’s...
Telus Corp. told the CRTC that it is not charging more for the services it...
There’s no need for BCE Inc.’s Northwestel to introduce wholesale...
Iristel Inc. filed a petition to the governor in council to vary a decision...
The CRTC is setting new deadlines for the implementation of next-generation 911 networks and services after delaying due to the pandemic. The regulator said in a decision Monday next-gen or NG911 providers will have until March 1, 2022, to “among other things, establish their NG911 networks, complete all NG911 production onboarding activities, and be ready to provide NG911 Voice, wherever public safety answering points (PSAPs) have been established in a particular region.” By that same date, telecommunications service providers (TSPs) will have to have made the...
Northern broadband provider SSi Canada is asking...
The CRTC has given interim approval to BCE Inc.’s Northwestel application for urgent relief that will allow to it waive data overage charges for its cable and fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) internet...
The CRTC has ordered BCE Inc.’s Northwestel to resubmit its “urgent” application for temporary relief in order to waive overage fees in response to the COVID-19 pandemic because the application...
CRTC chairman Ian Scott said the new internet code will address many of the...
BCE Inc.’s Northwestel says it will begin providing internet service at speeds three times as fast as...
The CRTC’s order to BCE Inc. subsidiary Northwestel Inc. to file new cost studies last week “might finally bring effective telecoms competition to...
BCE Inc. subsidiary Northwestel Inc. can stop offering “destandardized” wireline Internet packages, the CRTC has ruled. In a decision posted Monday, the regulator approved...
Broadband infrastructure improvements have been completed in the remote community of Nahanni Butte, N.W.T., the federal government said in a Wednesday press release. The project to replace a...
Among the arguments from BCE Inc. and those supporting its appeal to federal cabinet of the CRTC decision mandating wholesale access to fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) networks is that the ruling will slow development of high-speed Internet infrastructure in outlying areas. But the high costs involved with getting that infrastructure into rural and more-remote communities means they already weren't high on the priority list, which leaves it up to smaller, home-grown companies and government to fill the void, said independent telecom analyst Bill St. Arnaud. "Most communities are, at best,...
When Channel Zero Inc. announced the launch of its Bloomberg TV Canada channel this week, it listed every TV-service provider that was carrying it and absent from that list was Canada's biggest provider of TV service. Channel...
The CRTC said Wednesday it will, in spring 2016, release a preliminary report on the results of an ongoing study of the broadband performance of various Canadian Internet service providers (ISPs). The regulator said in a press...
Northwestel Inc. has been given permission to dismantle its "manual mobile service" sites in the last six locations where it still offers the service, effective October 31. The CRTC approved the request to end the...
Northwestel Inc. is asking the CRTC to reconsider its move in March to eliminate a $20 surcharge the company charges some customers. The CRTC had ruled that Northwestel was no longer allowed to...
The CRTC announced Thursday that it will re-examine the definition and role of so-called basic services, paving the way for potential changes to the offerings telecom companies are mandated to make available to every Canadian. The regulator said it will examine several issues in the proceeding, including which services Canadians find necessary to participate in the digital economy, acceptable Internet upload and download speeds, the need for funding mechanisms to support the provision of modern telecom services, and the proper role of the CRTC, the government and industry players in the...
The Yukon government has cancelled an interim 911 service that would have allowed residents to dial 911, instead of a seven-digit phone number used by some responders, to reach all emergency personnel. The CRTC approved the...
The CRTC on Wednesday ordered BCE Inc.’s Northwestel Inc. to lower its Internet prices for new and existing customers to address the “disparity” between the cost of Internet in the...
Newly released results from a Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) survey show the availability of online video content is a factor for four in 10 Canadian Internet users who do not subscribe to cable TV. The data,...
BCE Inc.'s online TV-everywhere service, CTV Go, is now available to customers of Rogers Communications Inc. and four other TV service providers, CTV said Thursday. The network said in a press release that other broadcast...
The Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) on Friday asked the CRTC to prohibit Rogers Communications Inc., Shaw Communications Inc. and BCE Inc. from restricting the availability of their streaming...
MONTREAL — Quebecor Inc.’s Videotron hopes that producing original content exclusively for its Club Illico streaming service will help the company attract and keep subscribers, said...
BCE Inc. said Monday it has launched 4G satellite wireless service in four Northwest Territories communities. The company said the upgrade in Gameti, Nahanni Butte, Paulatuk and Ulukhaktok was part of Northwestel...
BCE Inc. has launched 4G wireless service in Pelly Crossing and Burwash Landing, Yukon, the company said in a press release Monday. Bell spokeswoman Jacqueline Michelis clarified in an email that the service is delivered...
The CRTC on Wednesday said it was awarding the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) almost $20,000 in costs for expenses incurred in three different proceedings, to be covered by various telecommunications companies. One of the awards was $3,948.68 to cover external legal fees in a case where Telus Corp. was seeking clarification on whether the wireless code applied to certain corporate accounts. Telus was ordered to pay for the full amount. Another award was worth $6,344.65 for a combination of internal and external counsel costs related to a CRTC process looking into enhancements to the...
The CRTC this year has ordered telecommunications companies to pay more than $230,000 to various organizations participating in different telecommunications proceedings, of which BCE Inc. and its...
Northwestel Inc. has been given permission to dismantle most of its "manual mobile service" sites in the North due to declining usage and increasing difficulty in maintaining the infrastructure. The CRTC said Wednesday...
The Yukon government is working with Northwestel Inc. to expand the 911 emergency call service to include every community in the territory, according to a Part 1 application sent to the CRTC on July 28. Currently 911 service is...
The CRTC said Monday it has granted Northwestel Inc. permission to charge extra to customers who subscribe to its Internet service without its landline phone service. The commission added that it has...
As the CRTC is set to reconsider what constitutes a basic telecommunications service, some voices are saying that it’s about time to include broadband Internet in that definition. Under current rules, basic service includes a telephone line “with capability to connect via low-speed data transmission to the Internet at local rates,” according to the commission’s website — a definition set in 1999 that includes services such as “Touch-Tone dialing” and “a copy of a current local telephone directory.” “We think it’s long since...
The CRTC said Monday it has allowed an exception to its rule that telecommunications service providers' affiliates must charge identical rates to the incumbent phone company that controls them when reselling its services that...
GATINEAU, Que. — The reviews the CRTC will be holding over the coming year, which include proceedings covering wholesale access to wireless and fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) networks, the future of...
The federal government’s new rural broadband funding program should help reduce the cost of connecting rural locations’ Internet services with the rest of the country and not just focus on...
The CRTC has ordered Northwestel Inc. to tweak its plan to modernize the North’s lagging telecom infrastructure with a renewed emphasis on fibre investments and will also launch proceedings next year to consider the high cost of Internet backhaul and how best to fund northern telecom infrastructure, the commission said. In a decision released...
Ice Wireless, a subsidiary of Iristel Inc., launched a high-speed wireless service that’s well suited to accommodating the latest in smartphones and tablets, in the Nunavut capital of Iqaluit. It said in a press release Friday that its service provides an alternative to the “spotty, overpriced cellular coverage” that for years had...
Northwestel Inc.’s new modernization plan contains an “unhealthy emphasis” on delaying potential competitors from offering services in the North, competitor SSi Micro Ltd. told a panel of CRTC commissioners. “The latest iteration of the modernization plan still contains inadequate commitments,” Dean Proctor, SSi’s...
Northwestel Inc.’s revised modernization plan fails to meet northerners’ telecom needs, representatives from the Yukon and Northwest Territories governments told a panel of CRTC commissioners Monday. “The problem is that Northwestel still has no plan to deal with the current unmet needs for broadband and...
The CRTC should require Northwestel Inc. to improve the availability and cost of its Internet backhaul infrastructure, not its last-mile wireless services, the company’s smaller competitors said in regulatory documents this week. In an intervention filed with the commission Wednesday, SSi Micro Ltd. said the CRTC...
The CRTC denied an Iristel Inc. and Ice Wireless Inc. request that it order Northwestel Inc. to stop launching new telecom services—and to stop reducing the rates of its existing services—until after a “holistic” review of Northwestel’s regulatory framework, the commission said. In a complaint filed with the commission in August, Iristel and Ice Wireless said Northwestel, a BCE Inc. subsidiary, had given itself an unfair advantage by delaying the implementation of local competition in its northern service territory after decades of operating under a CRTC-mandated monopoly. The companies said Northwestel had unfairly introduced new services and had changed the price of other services while awaiting a CRTC hearing, scheduled for this June, to determine a new...