OTTAWA – On August 21st, Statistics Canada, issued its Consumer Price Index (CPI) report for July 2019. In its highlights, the number crunchers led with a strong impact from the telecom sector in the changes that month.
It mentions consumers paid less for telecom services, but way more more for devices in July, as compared to June 2019, thanks to the recent shifts in the industry.
“Consumers paid 2.5% less for telephone services in July compared with June. The decline follows an industry-wide shift in the pricing structure of cellular data plans amid intensifying competition among wireless providers,” reads the release. “The widespread introduction of unlimited data plans coincided with a reduction in the subsidies for wireless devices, shifting more of the cost of devices to consumers.”
“Consequently, the multipurpose digital devices index, which includes prices for tablets and smartphones, rose 42.5% month over month. Telephone services account for 2.29% of the 2017 set CPI basket of goods and services, while multipurpose digital devices account for 0.24%, they conclude.
With the carriers having separated the device from the service plans on their bills, StatsCan looks to be making a more accurate tally of the costs of the services and the devices.
