September 30, 2005
telus sucks
Telus, my local telco monopoly, truly, desperately sucks. Here’s why:
- Their customer service is legendary in it’s inadequacy. They really don’t care about you. This is a sweeping statement - I’ve had a few good experiences with some very good Telus employees, but the overall culture is “we don’t care”, or “we don’t have time for you”.
- Their upper management is weird. And not in a good way.
- They have a crappy, annoying voice-recognition phone system that makes me want to swallow my own face.
- They have a bitter labour dispute happening, and they fight dirty, and have total support of the local media.
- They have the worst on-hold music on the planet. Really, where do you even find music like this?
- Their billing system is totally fucked up right now. My paper bill says I owe them $300, and the “My Account” interface on their website says they owe me $170. Also - I can’t have both an “e.Bill” and a paper bill any more. They force you to pick one or the other. Maybe they do this to hide the inconsistencies? Lame!
- I was on hold today trying to sort out my billing issues, and the line just went dead all of a sudden and I was cut off… AND THEY’RE THE &*^#&% PHONE COMPANY!
…
OK, I feel better now 
tags: telus
posted: 10:02 am
Yep, Telus sucks! Stick to paper, it costs them more money for admin. When you do finally get it sorted out, pay your bill by cheque [ugh! make a copy:-)]and by mail to keep their managers distracted and busy.
Hey, i posted a comment here a few days ago! It is not here anymore. sniff.
I need to approve all the comments before they get added, so sometimes it takes longer to see them.
Seems like you were having some problems with the comment system?
Unfortunately, doing all that keeps me distracted and busy too!
Found your blog by way of Googling "Telus Sucks" because they’ve made me angry again!
Every time I tried to use eBill, I kept getting JSP servlet errors, so I thought, meh, my cell phone bill is $16 a month (I found out about their super secret SmallTalk plan) and I kept paying $16 every month.
Today eBill miraculously worked and I can’t figure out why I have a balance of $60. I only use my cell phone to call the transit line, so I don’t think I spent all 50 minutes a month on that. I know I went over last month, but not by much.
I can’t see my usage at all, because it wasn’t available. I can’t see who I called because it doesn’t seem to be available either. My invoices only go back to August, and I need to see farther back.
They kept telling me to sign up with eBill and reduce the clutter, so I did…woe, woe is me…have dealt with customer service before many times (from residential to hosting) when they fubared, I figured it was just easier to pay the $60.
Telus makes me so angry…I don’t know why. Not even baby seal clubbers make me as angry as Telus does.
Ouch.
Maybe you should ask for a rebate on some of that $60. Telus is required to give rebates for "service interruptions" - and their billing system is part of their service, in my opinion. Telus needs to be held to account.
I had a good experience with a Telus employee just now. As I was riding my bike past the Telus store downtown, my bike chain fell off. A picketing Telus employee came to the rescue and without hesitation helped me put it back on. It was really nice.
I’m impressed by the determination of the Telus employees and BC teachers. In today’s extreme anti-labour environment in BC, it takes a lot to stand up for workers’ rights.
Hi Keith,
Thanks for the advice
I would have been willing to go to Telus CS, but I don’t want to repeat past experiences. In the past I have spent hours on the phone getting passed from department to department. It’s just easier to cough up the dough.
I don’t blame the workers. They’re just doing their job. There must be something so fundamentally wrong with Telus inside though that issues can’t be resolved quickly and reasonably.
I am thinking of switching to Virgin Mobile, even if it costs me a little more to buy the phone. It’s just not worth to be so angry at Telus all the time. I have no rational explanation for why they make me feel that way :S I wish I knew why!
Hi Keith, My son-in-(common!)-law Ryan directed me to your site so that I could rant about Sympatico. I have spent HOURS on the phone with those poor ignorant sots who are the technical support people. They aren’t technically competent and they’re not supportive.
Sympatico isn’t.
Yes, I’ve had some terrible phone support experiences too.
Too bad there isn’t more competition - it would be nice to be able to just switch to another provider if the one you’re on isn’t giving you good value.
Say hi to Ryan for me
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Telus truly sucks monkey dick!! They fucked me around for the first 3 months of my wireless contract until one day I snapped and told them to shove it. I work in a large area of S/W Winnipeg that has terrible network/transmission problems with Telus mobility. The company knows about these issues but for the past 6-8 months apparently has done nothing to fix the problem. They continue to sign up new customers without warning them that this part of town has network problems. After 3 months of frustration/anger from dealing with Telus I have pulled the plug on my 2 cellular phones and on my contracts. I was constantly losing calls, phone is switching from roam to analog to digital and calls can’t be made or recieved for most of the day. This is the case for many of my co-workers/associates who are on Telus. I was with MTS mobility for 6 years and never had a lost call/network problem anywhere in the city. The last straw was last month. I sent one of my phones in for a repair on a cracked face-about $40-which I was willing to pay for. When my local dealer calls me after 4 weeks and tells me to pick up my newly repaired phone, I show up and the phone is handed to me in the same condition as when I first sent it out for repair. I get this BS story someone made a mistake, and were sorry, and will send it out again BLAH BLAH!!!! I threw the phone on the counter and walked out. Telus in now threatning me with charges for $1200 and saying if I don’t pay they will make a report with the credit bureau. Big fucking deal!!! My bank said my credit is at the highest rating and something this minor will do little to change that. You pricks are’nt getting another cent form me!!! I am back with MTS 24 hours later.
I found a way to piss off Telus. If you have a complaint, call the CRTC!!! Telus is scared of them and it is amazing who calls from Telus and what they are will ing to do to make you happy. They treated me like a king after that. Then as soon as I got all the things that I need. I waited a couple of days and ordered new high speed internet from Shaw (Which I am told is faster and the security is free unlike Telus) and ordered new phone service. This will take a couple of weeks. I can’t wait to tell Telus what they can do with there service. No company should treat their customers like that. I am on a mission to persuade people to change. I am starting in the Edmonton Area. I have most my friends already change their internet and phone. If you do go the CRTC way, do us all a favor. Still cancel your service !!!! Staying with them means that they win. In Edmonton you can keep your number if you go from Telus to Shaw phone.
YA TELUS FUCKIN SUCKS..
Ok how about this for sucking…before I get into how I have been burned so much by telus you should understand that my area has no other landline service. Telus has it totally monopolized. Recently cable service is offered and i will soon be switching to voip.
My first bad experience was when my phone service started cutting in and out and would hang up and respond erratically on my home line. It was completely unusable. I phoned telus and was treated rudely by a csr basically shrugging it off and blaming my phone. 3 weeks later i was finally able to convince (through swearing and screaming) a technician to come and take a look. When he showed up a nosy neighbor walked up to him and he proceeded to have a lengthy chat with her..presumably about the service he was about to do at my residence. After this he began bithing and moaning to me that he had to go into my crawl space to check the lines.(he was severely obese) He basically acted as if it was my fault and left in a huff with no service rendered. I was aghast to say the least. I couldnt believe what had happened. He shortly came back in fear of what i may be able to do to his job and basically said he would hook up one end of the line and i could run it myself. Which I did.
Ok fast forward a year or so and i am on dialup internet with them. I get a bill on my phone for a psychic hotline 900 number to the tune of 180$. WTF. I lived alone and do not believe in psychics and definately did not phone a psychic for 100 minutes in my sleep. After telling a Telus CSR my woes they explain to me its just too bad i have to pay. Unbelievable. So I promptly filed a complaint with the CRTC after which crtc rep told me that there was a one time waiver for situations like this. So I call back telus(waiting through their ridiculous crap each time) and was rudely told no I still had to pay as they suspect my modem had done it and a virus was most likely the culprit and they werent responsible. Well that takes the cake. I can only imagine what happens to poor old ladies on social assistance that get 500-1000$ bills from telus for a damn virus. Anyways, I paid
3 years later and present day I have a 3rd party long distance now as its the only nontelus service you can get. With the labour dispute recently I am wondering maybe if there has been restructuring and CRTC ordered them publicly to clean up their act. High speed DSL becomes available in my area.deciding to possibly risk it I phone and inquire…am told I get a free ipod only if i use their long distance which i dont. So I go online and look at the promo and that isnt true they just give you a 5$ discount off service. so I phone back and ask if it is unlimited downloads and was told yes. The catch is you have to commit to a contract with them for 1,2 or 3 years. 3 years you get an ipod nano. No thanks. So I take the 1 year with 4 months free and a free 512 ipod and unlimited. Now get this …2 months later no ipod..not even the shipping tracking email (told there is shortage of ipods although my friend who signed up later got his). And heres the clincher ..there is a limit of 30 gigs. And to top it all off its slow as hell and i consistently have the highest ping in my online games. Ruthless but i will cost them more then they got from me through negative publicity and telling all my friends and family to give them the minimum they possibly can and to complain to crtc as much as possible. TELUS SUCKS
Wow. Hope all the hate you’re spewing is at least giving you some pleasure. Look, I work for Telus, and it seems to me that you’re focusing entirely on the negative aspects without recognizing any of the positive. okay, fine, telus isn’t perfect. find me one company that is flawless and i’ll fall over in shock. you think voip’s so wonderful? you can’t even accept collect calls, or have any freedom of choice in your calling features. wow, shaw has a $55 unlimited package. that’ll work out famously for the 13% of market share that actually spends that much on their monthly phone bills. what about the rest of us? not to mention, at least telus has done a hell of a lot to support the community, and not just out west. the company has donated MILLIONS of dollars to support arts and science programs all throughout canada. we also have a completely paperless work environment to reduce the senseless destruction of trees. (unlike some companies … look at how kimberly clarke’s been raping the boreal rainforest for the past few decades)
lighten up. if you don’t like your phone service, change it. but don’t think that you’ll never encounter a problem with your new provider.
thanks for the comment.
good point - all of these comments have been focussing on the negative - but then again that’s what a rant is - whoever heard of a fair and balanced rant?
i don’t agree that this conversation is "spewing hate". it’s just people expressing frustration with their telephone service.
>if you don’t like your phone service, change it.
many people don’t have that option.
>okay, fine, telus isn’t perfect. find me one company
>that is flawless and i’ll fall over in shock.
true, but i’ve never had as many bad customer service experiences with another company (ok Iomega came close).
>the company has donated MILLIONS of dollars to support
>arts and science programs all throughout canada. we also
>have a completely paperless work environment to reduce
>the senseless destruction of trees.
that’s great - it’s good to see companies engage in socially and environmentally conscious behavior. doesn’t get them off the hook though.
don’t take it personally! like i said at the top of my rant, i’ve had good experiences with Telus employees - I don’t blame them for the situation. I think it’s probably mostly due to mismanagement. Telus is a cash-cow monopoly. They have the cash to pay their service people better, hire more of them, and improve the service. That just hasn’t been their priority (from my experience).
well to we recieved a extra phone bill from a number that was disconnected and were told that any1 with your telus id number can hook up a phone and you will recieve the bill very POOR security iam pisssed
we paid the bill 3 month ago contacted telus said that we did not want the phone hooked up again ever they said ok and we recieved another bill today for a phone we never connected so today we called again the only way to stop a person from hooking up a phone in your name is not to pay your bill wreck your credit rating and it will become red flaged i was told never let any1 get your phone bill because they will hook up anyone THEY JUST WANT YOUR MONEY ZERO SECURITY with telus
Aha!! I know it all…all of it. I used to work there and I see all the messed up bills…the handsets put out with every issue in the book-have an LG 3200 and having a probem-good luck, or a Motorola V710-issues issues issue…billing issue-check your bills-some big ones are coming-check billing for long-distance you did not make-trust me check check check I know it alllllllllllll.
I used to work for TELUS Mobility-I really cared about helping clients with their issues be it billing/hardware or network and the really SAD thing is that I was very much alone. Coming from a former employee-a)you WILL get a different answer everytime you call-guaranteed b) try fighting about aforementioned wrong information-good luck-that person that told you you had unlimited this or that NEVER wrote any notes c)there are billing MISTAKES-oodles and oddles of them-they will never tell you that you were overcharged $60 last month-go over every single bill with a fine tooth comb-check your evening calls-know what time your free calling starts at d) don’t sign a contract-your phone will NOT last 3 years (LG3200 p.o.s.)unless you let it gather dust. KNOW exactly what you are supposed to be getting-insist your account is documented with the information you were given, BUY your phone-it will cost you more now-but you can leave at anytime-TELUS hates that and it gives you leverage. Good luck..you will need it..I know.
well ive been having problem ever since by 6 months of telusmobility service ended. i had paid for a feature mobile to mobile. extra costs up front at the dealers cost of $40 cuz knew the dealer. next thing i know after 6 months get charged for my call to other telus cusomers well customer service told me mobile to mobile is only within my account ok tried to scam the system and failed ok big deal lost 40 dollars. ok switch to a telus to telus plan. guess what still being charged. my friend who i got to sign up with telus cause of this mobile to mobile thing all have it working fine. now i call them and ask for my bill to be reviewed for telus to telus. guess what they say we need all the numbers you call that are telus. im like u want me to list all the number that i call that are telus. there like yes then we can credit you fro those number. but im like i dont know what network everyones on can;t call everybody just to ask them what network. but there like thats the only way they can help me but im like its your system y can;t you guys look at my bill and check it for telue to telus. well they checked one number and only one number and it ended up being telus to telus so they crdited me 140 for that one number well im like what about the other now you must believe me im being charge for telus to telus there like we need a list. im like first off im a telus buiness mobile client. im not going to ask poeple who call me if there on telus. shes like thats what i woudl do. im like no its not my job to know your system should know on its own not my job to provided this info. but the supervisor said the same thing. i got a 800 dollar bill. and they refuse to send it to be reviewed and are making me pay unless i provide them with every number thats a telus number. so how gay is this. anyone know what i coudl do. breach of contract over charging me
I am not a fan of Telus what so ever. any company that has a monopoly tends to have terrible customer service and Telus is a prime example.
After many years of bad customer service, I switched to Shaw’s phone service. I have never been over billed. The 411 service is fantastic (and free), I have more calling features (at no charge) than I even use. I don’t look at the clock before I call long distance to make sure it’s "cheap-time". I had one issue with a faulty modem and it was replaced that night at no charge. Their over seas rates are the best I have ever seen.
I am finally telus-free!!! And I am loving it! It’ll be a cold day in hell before I switch voluntarily back to Telus phone service. Screw them and their voice recognition answering service! (tip:I found that swearing usually put me through to someone faster)
No company is perfect and I don’t blame the employees for doing a job that the company finds acceptable. I blame the company for not coaching their staff, caring about their customers well being, having a billing system that is only rivaled by Rigers for being THAT messed up, and their lack of compassion for being paying their salaries.
Good bye Telus! Thanks for screwing me for years and not even buying me a box of chocolates for the pleasure you’ve received.
Hi there. I signed on with Telus in June 2005. 2 phones with unlimited PTT. Kyocera and LG. Problems with billing from day 1 — it was crazy. My husband travels North America wide which was why we got the phones, thought it might help somewhat with the bills which can get huge. He had a North America digital plan on his. One month his bill was over $1000 — when it was normally $300. It showed oodles of calls and even during times we were using PTT — and it showed one call lasting 88 minutes and the next call 8 minutes or so after the first call. I spoke to Telus CS constantly and could get no resolution on it, ended up they cancelled my contract and of course now I’m dealing with collections. There are no Telus offices on the East Coast — only dealers and they know squat. I could never get assistance or even clarification on anything. Telus more than sucks.
CanadianMade
I’m done with Telus because it’s… They keep on sending me bills eventhough I have reported that my phone has been stolen/lost and I would like to freeze my account. I’m not happy with the bills because I didn’t use a second on my phone. I talked to them and they wanted me to pay the balance. Then I decided to cancel my account. My contract was almost finished at the time. Few weeks later, the credit bureau sent me a report of $88.72. I called them and explained to them what happened. The credit bureau wants me to speak to Telus. I called Telus and they didn’t want to speak to me and they wanted me to call the credit bureau…what the??… So who am I supposed to talk to? The credit bureau is willing to give me $10 off my balance but I didn’t use any seconds. What should I do?
When I went to use my valley first debit card today they said all the lines were down but just for the credit union users. When I went down to the credit union they said that it was an ongoing telus problem and that they were being hounded by many businesses asking what the **** is going on? If it isn’t bad enough that telus screws over the common guy they apparentley have no problem screwing over fellow big business either because in my town at least it got to the point where businesses put signs in their windows saying what was happening before you purchased. Thanks Telus and because I couldn’t get a hold of you personally thanks to your message system let me tell you this FUCK YOU! I was on hold for over an hour just to say that to a person of human pursuasion.
I have been Telus free for two or more years. It feels great. Pretty much the only Telus supporters I have know of, are paid for their support. They are Telus employees.
You are absolutely right !
As someone in ‘the know’ I know very well tha the President of TELUS, and his C-Suite team, are very concerned by the amount of complaints they get at the CRTC. TELUS pays millions in fines every year if the exceed a certain quota of complaints … so feel free go ahead the CRTC is your best ally…
I also work at TELUS and have to counter Kathleen’s assertion that TELUS is a "completely paperlsss work environment". TELUS still thrives on paperwork and while the amount of paper used had dropped over the last few years, TELUS is by no means anywhere near a "completely paperless work environment" and won’t be for quite a while yet.
There is also not much positive to brag about at TELUS internally with manager’s benefits getting constantly reduced - they’re not protected by the union and the company toys with them with no opposition. One example, long term sick leave in the past two years at TELUS has gone from 260 working days to 130 working days to now less than 65 working days. One bad car accident or a heart attack will basically end your career at TELUS as a manager as 65 days (about 13 weeks or 3 months) is nothing compared to the time it will take to recover from a heart attack or very serius injuries. What do the manager’s say about this - not much, they’re unhappy but then they just turn around and just keeping dodging the bullets coming at them.
I have been waiting for over 6 months to get a phone line installed.
I live in a slightly rural area, but the person one telephone pole away from me has phone. I have no option but to get telus to install the line, and as such feel like I am being taken advantage of. How can a company that has a monopoly be allowed to do this. I have no cell phone coverage, and as such am without phone. I hope I don’t have a medical emergency….
Telus truely is horrible. We have their enhanced highspeed line (3mbit apparently) which somehow hardly ever connects faster than 1mbit… yesterday the internet went out for all of BC for 3 hours at least. now today i cant connect faster than 120 k which is just midly faster than 56k dialup. I waited on hold for 40 minutes when i called technical support only to find out that there is nothing that can be done about it?? great.
I have been a telus customer for 10 yrs in alberta i finnaly leave there to get ahead and when I went to cancel service the internet part dinged me 127.00 dollars! I asked to move my service to sask but they dont provide here. Does it seem wrong to charge me for canceling service since they cannot provide it!? I think so but some snotty B&&&h at the " customer care centre " thinks that it is indeed o.k. I dissagree. So…… crtc here I come. mabey telus wants me to stay in the hell hole alberta. I want telus to pay me for being on hold for what seems like half of my 28 years on this planet. And I would like to beat up the person whose voice is on the speech recognition. Is that evil… think not . Give me ideas to stick it to telus . PLEASE!!!!!
I’ve been having the same problem as Daniel. I pay for 1.5Mb but get no better than dial-up speeds. It seems to have started ever since the whole town of Whistler lost internet service for 6 days back in December when the fiberoptic cable link on Hwy 99 broke. Telus support staff have forced me to test and test for almost two months and no one knows what’s wrong. They just now agreed to refund me for the whole month of December. However, the way the billing agent rushed me off the phone, I can only hope they really apply the refund on my bill.
I had similar problems with Telus mobility. I really had to fight with them to get some money back. Then they did not even apply the refund to my bill, so I had to call back and ask again. They are so sloppy, it makes me wonder if they aren’t melting down.
I am still waiting for my three ( have 3 phones) gift certificates for Amazon for the xmas promotion. We are now in February.
I am so irritated that I am now sending e-mails to any telus employees e-mail I can find.
I just can’t imagine how many telus clients choose to do the $25 donotion to a charity and how many Telus actually gave on behalf of their clients.
Aggravated in Quebec