It’s been officially 16 days since arriving back in Canada. At last my cell phone works (which, incidentally, was purchased brand new and activated at a Rogers store), but not without several days of a non-usable phone, while I waited for Rogers to “look into it”, a bunch of phone calls to tech support, and snotty customer service people.

The long story short: Rogers assigned my new phone (and my wife’s new phone) telephone numbers that were specifically “reserved for internal testing purposes”. I know a good three letter acronym (Dub-Tee-Eff) that could be used somewhat appropriately in this situation.

What I continue to be amazed at is that these monstrously large corporations (all but monopolies, with not nearly enough Government control over the rights of consumers, in my opinion), still haven’t clued in to the fact that it’s no longer considered cool to gouge their customers for every last penny, nickle-and-diming for every “value added service”.

After two years of being in Singapore and paying the equivalent of CDN$12/month for my cell phone plan, which included 100 anytime minutes, 1000 text messages, call display and voicemail – I came home to the abomination that is our Canadian cell phone industry.

Now, in my opinion, I don’t consider a cell phone “usable” without voicemail and call display. Those are now considered standard features in my books. If you hand me a cell phone without these, it’d be like handing me a new car and saying I had to pay extra if I wanted it to come with an engine and a transmission.

Between Bell, Fido (AKA Rogers), Rogers and Telus – the main four up here in the GWN, your “choice” as a consumer basically amounts to who you want to get screwed by. You can do research and make “choices” all you want, but in the end, your research will be for nothing, and you might as well choose the company based on how pretty their logo is, because no matter who you pick, you’re going to get screwed.

All companies advertise their most primitive, basic plan as a plan that costs about $25/month. But none of them tell you until you look into the fine print that on top of that, you have to pay a “non-governmental System Access Fee” of $6.95/month for “maintaining the network” (or $8.95/month if you choose to be screwed by Bell).

Also, you can forget text messages, voice mail or call display. Any of these things costs extra. And I’m not talking like $2/month either. If you want to get a standalone voicemail package from Rogers (if you choose to get screwed by the company with the bad logo and terrible web site) you’re going to pay $8/month. Fortunately (if you can call it that), all of our lovely providers offer you some “Excellent Deals” if you bundle services together. So I get to save a tremendous amount of money, and feel slightly less screwed because I can get a “Special Bundle” that allows me to have voicemail, call display and 125 text messages for the low, low price of only $10/month!.

Don’t forget that extra $0.75/month for the “911 fee”. I mean, seriously? Are you fricking kidding me people? And if that wasn’t enough add some good ol’ Government style GST to chalk on another 6%.

That means, if I do the math correctly, my $25/month cell phone plan, made usable by purchasing the engine and transmission (voicemail and call display) separately, plus other random and special fees works out to

($25.00 + $10.00 + $6.95 + $0.75) * 1.06 = $45.26

WHAT IS GOING ON HERE??! Why in the name of all things pure and holy should I have to pay $45.26 per month for a $25/month cell phone plan? When are you big giant corporations going to get a clue that profit is not the be-all-end-all, and that your customers are sick and tired of being repeatedly screwed over by your greed. When will the government finally step in and do something about it? When are consumers going to start to demand better?