This has got to be one of the most perplexing money grabbing fees that I have seen for a cell phone. Coming August this year in Canada Bell and Telus Mobility will be introducing a 15 cent fee for simply receiving a text message on your device. Before, it was free to receive messages but it costs you money to send messages.

Apparently they can’t afford to allow people to receive free text messages or something along those lines. This makes me wonder how it is going to work for text messaging services such as our public transportation system Translink. Nowadays, you can simply send Translink a text message with a special number and it will automatically send you a text message all of the bus schedules. I guess that means someone will get charged for sending the message and then receiving one too.

I wonder how high of a bill heavy Blackberry or other data phone users are going to experience with this.

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So I finally got my new cell phone and decided to go with Telus as they offered me a great deal as my new plan essentially cuts my old bill in half with a lot more features. It was kind of funny as all of my experiences in dealing with the customer support people on the phone were great, but going to a store vendor was a different story.

When I went to purchase the phone from this store and to activate the plan the person was trying to upsell me different items. I personally don’t mind that as he was simply doing his job. However, he then tried to mislead me on how the plan that I was offered was only valid if I bought specific things from him. He even then implied he just confirmed it with a representative from Telus as well about this stipulation. My answer was that I would simply do business elsewhere if that was the case and he immediately proceeded to process what the person on the phone offered me.

The person didn’t seem to have processed the order correctly though as the contract that he wanted me to sign seemed to have had some features missing. He told me that I would see the changes when I login to my account and not to worry. As a test, I asked him if I could check it right there on the spot and he mentioned that he wasn’t capable of accessing my account information.

Of course I knew something was wrong as the guy was really nervous after. Since I was in a hurry I just took his word for it and it seemed like he was going to wet his pants or something which I didn’t want to stick around for. Sure enough, there was an error when I checked it the day after.

Today I phoned Telus directly though and it was pretty amazing of the night and day type of service. I simply told them about the issue and they did confirm that the plan that I was enrolled in was exactly what the person in the store punched in. Without any fuss though, they gave me what was missing and then more again at no extra cost.

This reminds me how it can be very important for businesses that have resellers or distribution partners to be consistent as like this situation one bad vendor could do a lot to affect the company’s image as a whole. Everything turned out great in the end though.

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