By Ahmad Hathout
Quebecor’s Videotron is asking the CRTC to get involved in adjusting the wholesale roaming access prices charged by SaskTel, which would reverse over a decade of regulatory forbearance.
In a Part 1 application with redactions made public Monday, Videotron is claiming it is being forced to pay unfairly high wholesale roaming prices to the dominant wireless service provider in Saskatchewan with no regulatory avenue because the CRTC in 2015 excluded the Crown corporation from the policy that regulated those rates for market power players Rogers, Bell, and Telus. However the regulator “retained the power to impose conditions on the offer and provision of mobile wireless services, and to make findings of unjust discrimination or undue preference.”
Videotron is now asking the CRTC to update its view after the regulator found that SaskTel exercised sole market power in a 2021 decision that forced the province’s telecom to open its wireless network to mobile virtual network operators.
“An illogical and unfair regulatory asymmetry persists, as the Commission has regulated SaskTel’s wholesale permanent roaming services, while its wholesale temporary roaming services, which are another facet of the same network access services, remain unregulated,” Videotron says in its application.
“The main victims of this asymmetry are wireless service users in Saskatchewan, who are deprived of the competitive benefits that permanent roaming regulations were specifically designed to provide,” Videotron added.
Otherwise, SaskTel is giving itself an undue preference and subjecting Videotron to an undue disadvantage, the Montreal-based telecom argues.
The alternative, Videotron argues, is “unrealistic and disproportionate”: spend hundreds of millions of dollars in spectrum acquisition – a requirement to access the MVNO regime – and infrastructure development “in a province where the Commission itself has recognized the existence of an effective monopoly, simply to gain access to a fair dispute resolution mechanism, would be contrary to the very objective of Canada’s policy of telecommunications, which aims precisely to promote competition without imposing prohibitive barriers to entry.”
Or Videotron says it can: just accept SaskTel’s offer of rates that it claims are out of touch with market conditions or it can just stop offering roaming services in the province.
Videotron, which argues there are barriers to entry with respect to replicating infrastructure in the province, is asking for the CRTC to establish the rates and terms of this access, which would open the door for staff-assisted mediation and final offer arbitration if required.
“SaskTel is aware of Videotron’s allegations and will respond fully to the CRTC to correct the record,” a spokesperson told Cartt.
Videotron declined to comment because the issue is now before the commission. The telecom and its subsidiaries are actively expanding into the western provinces.
Photo via SaskTel
