Sunday I realized that I hadn’t bought a new $20 cell phone card and applied it to my SaskTel pre-paid cell phone within 2 months of the last one. So SaskTel stole my remaining minutes I bought and applied in September. How, nice of them. I’m tossing my cell phone in a drawer for a few weeks to make it cost less this year. Unfortunately I charged it just yesterday.
I canceled my SaskTel MAX TV service this week. I think I’ll downgrade to HighSpeed Light now too, and save even more money. I’m considering Access Communication’s Internet deal for $25/month, which is faster than SaskTel HS Lite.
UPDATE: 2009 – Sasktel has changed the pre-paid plan, and no longer steal paid-for minutes if you use it for a second ever couple months.
@hotmail.com
![[EFC Blue Ribbon - Free Speech Online]](http://www.efc.ca/images/efcfreet.gif)
militantliberal | 12-Nov-07 at 1:52 pm | Permalink
Careful bashing Sasktel. Now that you people have thrown out the NDP Sasktel has a very short road to privatizeation.
Saskboy | 12-Nov-07 at 2:42 pm | Permalink
I’m not too concerned Militantliberal. SaskTel needs to get its priorities in order anyway. They are supposed to be delivering equal service to the province’s residents, but they took many extra years to add cell coverage to south-central outside of Assiniboia’s tower range, and now it only works 30 minutes in the day. Can you image if that happened in the city how quickly it would be fixed?
They charge more for dialup than they do for highspeed Internet. And as I pointed out here they steal your remaining paid minutes because they force you to buy more after two months because they want to force you to use your phone more than just for emergencies.
Under the guidance of our NDP Minister of SaskTel, Libraries, Liquor and Gaming, the crown corp spent over $110 Million to upgrade MAX to HD, while leaving many communities without even basic highspeed service! Socialism works – if you live in Regina or Saskatoon I guess.
The Sask Party has two choices: They’ll either make SaskTel into something that provides better service to ALL Saskatchewanians and the people will love them for it, or they’ll turn SaskTel into a Telus clone and people (especially those outside of the cities with no/little competition will hate them for it. The Sask Party will piss off rural Saskatchewan at their own peril.
Ah phones…
I just got a phone call from an auto-dialer. I answered on the 2nd ring and got:
“Due to an unexpected volume *click click*…”
militantliberal | 12-Nov-07 at 3:12 pm | Permalink
Don’t want to get into a whole thing . My first comment was meant to be more light hearted then it reads. Im just saying. Service complaints can be heard about both private and public operators. Just be careful not to throw away the Crown corporations you have without careful consideration. under Nafta no new crown corps are allowed. In Manitoba we privatized our phone service with mixed results. MTS is now more competitive globally with the service it offers and is probably a healthier company but it has much higher prices, employee’s who are paid less and only contributes to the govt in the form of income taxes. Sasktels profits can at the whim of the people be used for whatever you need. Our NDP does it all the time with Manitoba Hydro. MTS’s profits go to their shareholders. Ps Go Bombers
sassy | 13-Nov-07 at 5:29 pm | Permalink
Hi Saskboy,
This CBC Marketplace feature may be of interest to you. Not sure when it will air in your area.
HIGH SPEED SHOWDOWN
Wednesday, Nov. 21 at 7:30 p.m. (8 p.m. NT) on CBC Television
Erica Johnson clocks Canada’s largest Internet providers as she simultaneously tests their high-speed claims. What she finds will resonate with many frustrated service subscribers: some companies sell a speed they can’t deliver.
Big Money | 13-Dec-07 at 8:25 pm | Permalink
The problem is that SaskTel can not make everyone happy. Serving the small, remote and costly communities of SK costs money. SaskTel may be a Crown Corp but it also a business. STel should not just give every service to every community, at any cost. That is irresponsible and as a tax payer, i would be pissed if they did. The large communities have competition and if Stel does not compete they will loose too many customers and not be able to offer many services. People in rural SK should be thankfull they get what they can. They can have HS when lots of centre that are much larger in Canada or the US, can not. Try Access if you want, they are okay. However, give it a few years and they won’t likely be around.
Saskboy | 13-Dec-07 at 10:11 pm | Permalink
Big Money, I couldn’t disagree with you more.
“People in rural SK should be thankfull they get what they can.”
Is that just how urban Saskatchewan should be thankful they get what food they can?
Big Money | 14-Dec-07 at 8:30 am | Permalink
The reality is that the VAST majority of rural customers have high speed access. Nearly no other province or state can say that. 84.5% of the population of this great province have access to High Speed, and it is at a very reasonable price (even though it should be much higher for rural customers as it costs much more to serve them).
To your second point, the answer is yes. I am thankful for the food I get provided by the rural world and I not only expect to pay more for it if necessary but I would pay more and not bitch about it.
There is nothing more ironic to me then hearing an old farmer on coffee row complaining about the damn Crowns and the cost of services and how they are being goughed, just before he hopes into his $50K truck back to his new combine…..
Oh well, the rural people of this province wanted the SK party in power and they got it. Lets see how they do I guess. I am sure they will do more for the rural customers then the NDP, even if it is as the cost of everyone and everything else……..
RagingStudent | 14-Dec-07 at 2:32 pm | Permalink
“The reality is that the VAST majority of rural customers have high speed access.”
Are we talking about small communities/farms or towns here? The only farms I know of with broadband are within 5 kilometers of a town (Perdue for example) with the proper infrastructure for broadband. Otherwise its a) 56k over telephone lines from god knows when or b) ~$70 satellite (my parents opted for the latter).
“There is nothing more ironic to me then hearing an old farmer on coffee row complaining about the damn Crowns and the cost of services and how they are being goughed, just before he hopes into his $50K truck back to his new combine…..”
If anything the “farmers are a bunch of whiners living off government aid” argument makes me see red. Its a god damn hard and dangerous job (not a “lifestyle” as I’ve seen some people claim) that gets very little thanks. And for the record: the only new combines I know of locally belong to the Hutterites.
former farmboy | 24-Jan-09 at 10:14 pm | Permalink
Its funny that when a farmer buys a combine its seen as a luxury, but if any other business owner buys a piece of equipment of similar value, its a business upgrade. The truth is the farmers built this province, but don’t get the respect they deserve. Sasktel should be providing equal service, there is little need for a 14 y/o girl to have a cellphone in class, but a farmer who’s truck broke down 10 miles from home on a back road should be able to call for help.
Saskboy | 24-Jan-09 at 10:25 pm | Permalink
Ffarmboy, I agree.
Also this article needs updating, since I’ve dropped SaskTel as an ISP, and their pre-paid cells now work for 149 days without calling a number for a 1 second call, and you only have to apply one card until its minutes run out. They don’t expire the minutes since November 2008 (probably due to a law change in the province)!