By Denis Carmel
MONTREAL – In a news release issued on Friday, Quebecor claims it won a CRTC-adjudicated dispute in which the company alleged Bell had engaged in undue preference when packaging Bell Media’s sports channel RDS and Quebecor’s TVA Sports for Bell TV customers.
“In a letter sent to the parties earlier this week, which has been kept confidential to protect strategic information, the CRTC stated that Bell’s proposed new packaging structure still fails to comply with the decision issued in December 2019. The latest CRTC decision is yet another indication of Bell’s bad faith and the anti-competitive practices it unscrupulously employs in order to dominate the market,” their release reads.
The complaint filed in February 2019 came to a conclusion on December 19, 2019. CRTC Decision 2019-427 stated “The Commission finds that Bell (…) has conferred an undue preference upon RDS, its discretionary sports service, and has subjected the service TVA Sports to an undue disadvantage by packaging the two services in a different manner. The preference and disadvantage are undue since they have caused a material adverse impact on TVA Group Inc. and on the achievement of objectives of the Broadcasting Act.”
“Accordingly, the Commission directs Bell to report back to the Commission, by no later than 5 February 2020 on a new packaging structure that would neither unduly disadvantage TVA Sports nor unduly prefer RDS,” concluded the decision.
While the letter Quebecor cites in its press release remains confidential, it has been confirmed by the CRTC to Cartt.ca in an email the Commission “has determined that the new structure was not sufficient to mitigate the undue preference against TVA Sports and gave clear directives to Bell on how to proceed next. Bell will have to remove RDS from the “BON” package or add TVA Sports to the said package.”
Cartt.ca has made two requests to Bell for comment and will update this story if and when we receive a response.
UPDATE August 12: The CRTC made the letter public and it says while package adjustments made by Bell in February make sense going forward, it doesn’t do anything to address the existing packaging problem. While new customers would only be able to subscribe to Bell’s basic service, branded Départ, and then add channels on an à la carte or custom pack basis, Bell also said it would offer its “Bon” customers the choice of RDS or TVA Sports, but also offering a bonus of RDS2 if they choose to keep RDS.
The Commission explained in its analysis “there is a risk that inertia will cause the bulk of Bell’s Bon subscribers to stay with RDS. In particular, non-sports fans, or sports fans of ‘casual interest’ are unlikely to make a positive choice to switch,” reads the letter, which also adds “the addition of RDS2 would appear to grant a bonus for keeping RDS.”
“In light of the above, and noting the Commission’s determination in Decision 2019-427 that the exclusion of TVA Sports from Bon, in contrast to RDS, has had, and continues to have, a material adverse impact on TVA’s operations, the Commission finds that the packaging structure set forth by Bell in its 5 February letter does not fully remedy the undue preference/disadvantage… Therefore, the Commission directs Bell (at its choice) to either add TVA Sports to Bon, along with RDS, or remove RDS from Bon, and offer both services in the same program offering.”
