TORONTO — Canadians had fewer official complaints about their wireless communication services but more concerns about their Internet plans, according to the latest report from the telecom industry's consumer watchdog.
The Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services says that the number of complaints it accepted about telecom services fell to 9,988 in the year ending July 31, from 11,340 in the previous year.
Internet complaints now account for 26.1 per cent of all telecom complaints, up by more than half since last year. Wireless complaints have dropped from more than 60 per cent of the total to 52.9 per cent.
This year marks the first time since the industry-funded consumer agency began collecting records in July 2007 that the proportion of complaints about wireless services has fallen.
In 2013, the CRTC implemented a new wireless code of conduct for telecom providers. The CCTS said in this latest report that it found 582 violations of the code, up from 30 the year before.
One company, Wind Mobile, accounted for 422 of those breaches, most of which were releated to its unlimited roaming plan between Canada and the United States.
BCE was again the biggest target, accounting for 36 per cent of the overall complaints. Rogers Communications Inc. came in second at 18.2 per cent of complaints, followed by Wind Mobile, at 7 per cent, and BCE-owned Virgin Mobile at 6.1 per cent.
