TORONTO — Distributel is the latest company to announce COVID-19 mitigation measures with the news Monday it will waive all data caps for residential Internet customers for a minimum of three months, to support the large number of people who will be at home for the coming weeks.
Effective immediately, Distibutel’s Internet customers across Canada, including those in the rural communities it serves, will have unlimited Internet access. No action is required by customers, as these measures will be automatically applied to their accounts, says the news release.
“This is not something anyone could have prepared for,” said Matt Stein, CEO. “Many of our customers chose limited data plans when they believed they would be at work and school all day, but their usage will change dramatically as they do their part to help contain the virus. We know how important it will be for people to stay connected to friends and family, as well as work, during this already stressful time. Data overage charges are not something people should be worried about right now.
“Given the growth of the freelance economy and workplace flexibility we’ve seen in recent years, our products are designed to support telework,” added Stein. “We’re ready to help Canadians, and by extension the Canadian economy, carry on with business as usual. By doing so, we are committed to helping Canadians stay safe and healthy and enabling them to work from home and carry on with their daily responsibilities.”
Distributel says in the release the health of its employees is a top priority and the company is taking precautionary steps to lessen the public health risk from COVID-19 within its business. The company is encouraging all of its employees to work from home, to limit in-person meetings, whether internal or with vendors, partners or clients, and to use video conferencing whenever possible.
“Distributel is well-equipped for a situation where extended remote work is required and its people will continue to leverage cloud-based tools, architectures and conferencing capabilities to stay in contact with customers, and to provide the high levels of service they have come to know and expect. It is also working to ensure that 100 per cent of employees across the company can fulfil their roles remotely in the weeks ahead,” reads release.
