Sunday, August 17, 2003
"Just give me unlimited everything!"
Are you happy with the service today you have received from Bell Canada? Yes. Is there anything more I can do for you? No, that’s all thank you. Have you considered subscribing to the "accessibility bundle?" Um, no?
Call waiting/visual call waiting. 2$ a month?
Call forwarding-dial *72. Cancel with *73
Call return-dial *69 for last number called and *66 to tell you when the line is free. -75cents per use.
Three-way (conference) calling-*71 -75 cents per use.
Ident-A-call: can have 2 distinct telephone rings.
call block-free-*67 before dialing the number
Call trace-*57-5$per use. to trace # of 'blocked' caller.
Call screen-*60-allows you to block up to 12 telephone numbers.
The 'privacy bundle', 'messaging bundle', 'display bundle', 'accessibility bundle'
Internet call display-notifies you of an incoming call while you are on the Internet.
Call answer and call answer plus-an answering service for around 6$ per month. You need to enter in *98 and than your password followed by additional automated prompts to retrieve your message. On a cell phone there are an additional 9 playback options for listening to your messages. These include controlling the speed of the replay and fastforward/rewind.
Cell phones additional features are: text messaging and email relay-couple dollars a month
Web browser for 100 minutes per month-5$
Voice dial-where the phone dials numbers on your voice command-cost?
'Roaming service'-for using phone throughout North America on other cell networks
Currently I have been trying to set up my cell phone to yahoo messenger so I can talk online to friends. I've got that figured out, but haven’t figured out setting up yahoo email alerts to my phone.
I got a Wintel flyer in the mail the other month with a long distance offer. It was 7 cents anywhere in Canada and US-anytime. I signed up. 2 weeks later, a Bell Canada representative calls me up asking me why I switched to Wintel. He said they would match the price if I came back, and therefore wouldn’t have the worry of 2 separate bills. I agreed. He than had a woman come on line to witness and validate my switchback.
As a favor for a friend in prison, I tried to make my phone available to him and work around the whole prison phone setup. It is so ridiculous that they only allow outgoing collect calls with no incoming. I talked to a few Bell Canada agents and operators about the collect call rates. The cost of the first minute was alot if long distance and to get around phone calls being monitored prisoners would ask the recipient to make a 3 way call that couldn’t be traced. Or could it? I don’t know.
In Dec 2001, I got a call from Bell with their cell phone package deal. Normally I would have refused, but since I had a 250$ credit from a previous deposit I had to make, and the offer sounded good with this no contract/full refund stuff and because the guy started going on about his mom's cell phone, I was sold. (Embraced by the happy family of cell phone users)
But little did I know that this was just the beginning of a major telephone headache as I began dreaming of the good old days of the simple rotary phone and finding the math and the options more difficult to keep track of than financing and maintaining a car. Well almost.
Whenever a Bell Canada representative goes into their 'spiel and deal' about all the potential features and the latest promotional bundle package, I burst out laughing. Because they are presenting their offer with such sincerity and the fact that this cruel world had them memorize such a mouthful of ridiculous phone crap is just too much to handle. I'm so tempted to ask once they catch their breath: "you aren’t being serious?" or "please don’t tell me that you don’t realize how ridiculous you sound?" or "you really don’t expect me to make sense of what you just said."
Everywhere you walk-you see booths set up in plazas and subway posters advertising cell phones. For something around 50-100$ you get a 3-month package that includes: 100 weekday and evening minutes each month. 250 weekend minutes, monthly 911 and access fees, activation fee, etc. Than too you have to be conscious of your phone model. I got an Audiovox CDM 9100 tri-mode phone. Nokia, Sprint, Motorolla, Panasonic, Rogers/AT&T blah blah blah. And they each have endless versions to complicate things.
People have alot on their minds these days. Life is getting more and more complicated. I don’t want to be thinking about what telephone features I have and setting up international communication networks and how much I am being charged for every single second of airtime. I want to breathe. One day Bell Canada is going to pay for making us pay for every single feature. One day there will be competition that will take them to their knees and expose their exorbitant behavior and they will be labeled the lousy rip off artist they are. It's just like the Internet when it was taking off. People were paying for 10, 20 hours per month. But everyone really wants the freedom of unlimited. How much different the world would be with unlimited cell airtime and free long distance. Just think about it. It's almost as bad as walking into a service center and getting charged 25cent s for the first 'hello', 10 cents for each additional smile, the first 5 minutes of the conversation can be prepaid or you can go for the conversation bundle with unlimited smiles. Ridiculous.
Are you happy with the service today you have received from Bell Canada? Yes. Is there anything more I can do for you? No, that’s all thank you. Have you considered subscribing to the "accessibility bundle?" Um, no?
Call waiting/visual call waiting. 2$ a month?
Call forwarding-dial *72. Cancel with *73
Call return-dial *69 for last number called and *66 to tell you when the line is free. -75cents per use.
Three-way (conference) calling-*71 -75 cents per use.
Ident-A-call: can have 2 distinct telephone rings.
call block-free-*67 before dialing the number
Call trace-*57-5$per use. to trace # of 'blocked' caller.
Call screen-*60-allows you to block up to 12 telephone numbers.
The 'privacy bundle', 'messaging bundle', 'display bundle', 'accessibility bundle'
Internet call display-notifies you of an incoming call while you are on the Internet.
Call answer and call answer plus-an answering service for around 6$ per month. You need to enter in *98 and than your password followed by additional automated prompts to retrieve your message. On a cell phone there are an additional 9 playback options for listening to your messages. These include controlling the speed of the replay and fastforward/rewind.
Cell phones additional features are: text messaging and email relay-couple dollars a month
Web browser for 100 minutes per month-5$
Voice dial-where the phone dials numbers on your voice command-cost?
'Roaming service'-for using phone throughout North America on other cell networks
Currently I have been trying to set up my cell phone to yahoo messenger so I can talk online to friends. I've got that figured out, but haven’t figured out setting up yahoo email alerts to my phone.
I got a Wintel flyer in the mail the other month with a long distance offer. It was 7 cents anywhere in Canada and US-anytime. I signed up. 2 weeks later, a Bell Canada representative calls me up asking me why I switched to Wintel. He said they would match the price if I came back, and therefore wouldn’t have the worry of 2 separate bills. I agreed. He than had a woman come on line to witness and validate my switchback.
As a favor for a friend in prison, I tried to make my phone available to him and work around the whole prison phone setup. It is so ridiculous that they only allow outgoing collect calls with no incoming. I talked to a few Bell Canada agents and operators about the collect call rates. The cost of the first minute was alot if long distance and to get around phone calls being monitored prisoners would ask the recipient to make a 3 way call that couldn’t be traced. Or could it? I don’t know.
In Dec 2001, I got a call from Bell with their cell phone package deal. Normally I would have refused, but since I had a 250$ credit from a previous deposit I had to make, and the offer sounded good with this no contract/full refund stuff and because the guy started going on about his mom's cell phone, I was sold. (Embraced by the happy family of cell phone users)
But little did I know that this was just the beginning of a major telephone headache as I began dreaming of the good old days of the simple rotary phone and finding the math and the options more difficult to keep track of than financing and maintaining a car. Well almost.
Whenever a Bell Canada representative goes into their 'spiel and deal' about all the potential features and the latest promotional bundle package, I burst out laughing. Because they are presenting their offer with such sincerity and the fact that this cruel world had them memorize such a mouthful of ridiculous phone crap is just too much to handle. I'm so tempted to ask once they catch their breath: "you aren’t being serious?" or "please don’t tell me that you don’t realize how ridiculous you sound?" or "you really don’t expect me to make sense of what you just said."
Everywhere you walk-you see booths set up in plazas and subway posters advertising cell phones. For something around 50-100$ you get a 3-month package that includes: 100 weekday and evening minutes each month. 250 weekend minutes, monthly 911 and access fees, activation fee, etc. Than too you have to be conscious of your phone model. I got an Audiovox CDM 9100 tri-mode phone. Nokia, Sprint, Motorolla, Panasonic, Rogers/AT&T blah blah blah. And they each have endless versions to complicate things.
People have alot on their minds these days. Life is getting more and more complicated. I don’t want to be thinking about what telephone features I have and setting up international communication networks and how much I am being charged for every single second of airtime. I want to breathe. One day Bell Canada is going to pay for making us pay for every single feature. One day there will be competition that will take them to their knees and expose their exorbitant behavior and they will be labeled the lousy rip off artist they are. It's just like the Internet when it was taking off. People were paying for 10, 20 hours per month. But everyone really wants the freedom of unlimited. How much different the world would be with unlimited cell airtime and free long distance. Just think about it. It's almost as bad as walking into a service center and getting charged 25cent s for the first 'hello', 10 cents for each additional smile, the first 5 minutes of the conversation can be prepaid or you can go for the conversation bundle with unlimited smiles. Ridiculous.
