Bell cuts controversial tax

This Summer Rogers dumped it’s monthly SAF charge (oddly enough Rogers customers bills increased), last month Telus followed by ridding their SAF charge.  As early as November 20th Bell Mobility, that last of the big three Canadian carriers with a monthly SAF, will announce the elimination of their SAF.

What is the SAF?  The SAF is short for “System Access Fee”.  All three carriers have positioned the fee as a monthly charge that covers network maintenance and upgrades.

Here’s Bell Mobility’s official explaination:

The System Access Fee is charged monthly by Bell to help recover the costs associated with operating and maintaining a wireless network, including costs for ongoing maintenance, new equipment installations and technology upgrades.

The fee varied by carrier from $6.95 to $8.95 per month plus 911 Fees.

Of course there are still many BIG questions like:

1. How will Bell implement the elimination of the charge? Will they, like Rogers, increase the cost of their package by an amount greater than their current cost of their SAF.  Or will Bell follow Telus’ example and put a couple of bucks back in the pocket of their customers?

2. The second BIG question is will this change apply immediately to all customers on all plans, or will this apply to only new monthly plans forcing customers to upgrade their plans to get the savings?

Ultimately this should be good news for Cellarama customers everywhere.

Let’s wait for the official announcement and see.

To your wireless success,
Alvin