The newly formed Bell MTS says it plans to improve service to northern Manitoba customers, but Flin Flon MLA Tom Lindsey is taking a wait-and-see approach.
Bell received regulatory approval to acquire MTS earlier this year. As part of the deal, Bell MTS must provide wireless spectrum, six retail stores and 24,700 subscribers to a competing company, Xplornet.
These and other conditions were established to help Xplornet become a fourth player in the Manitoba wireless market alongside Bell MTS, Telus and Rogers.
Bell MTS is also selling 13 former MTS dealer locations and a quarter of the MTS cellular customers to Telus.
Lindsey, the NDP MLA, says these conditions do not open competition in the market to a level more advantageous for the consumer.
“Less competition is never a good thing when it comes to these things,” he said. “[Wireless] rates haven’t gone up yet, but that doesn’t mean they won’t. It hasn’t even been a year since the takeover, so we’ll see what happens going forward.”
Several months ago, Bell MTS announced it would hold MTS wireless price plans for a minimum of 12 months from March 2017, when the sale was completed.
Jeremy Sawatzky, a Bell MTS spokesperson, says all aspects of the Bell-MTS transaction are running smoothly – “including the straightforward transition for customers that were required to be transferred to Telus.”
In terms of service improvement, the company has moved forward with its proposal to develop wireless and hard-line infrastructure in the northern half of the province, he said.
“Bell MTS hit the ground running this past March with our $1 billion, five-year investment plan, delivering on our first infrastructure project by activating new LTE wireless service for the town of Churchill,” Sawatzky said.
“We have also announced plans for the expansion of mobile and wire-line broadband networks in northern Manitoba, including along Highway 6 to Thompson, in Flin Flon and in five small Indigenous communities: Easterville, Gods Lake Narrows, Gods River, Grand Rapids and Red Sucker Lake. We are still working through the detailed planning process that is required for each of these projects.”
Lindsey says there has been no service improvements in the area yet and suggests such a proposal is integral to the long-term development and safety of residents living in the North.
“Many communities don’t have sufficient service now. When you drive from Thompson to Lynn Lake, it’s a pretty long, lonely stretch of road,” he said. “There’s a lot of talk about improving service in the South because it’s a safety issue, but it’s a safety issue in the North as well. A new tower in Easterville has helped them, but it hasn’t done anything for the rest of the communities.”
Despite his assessment, Lindsey notes he has received no complaints on the issue directly to his office.
He has seen some negative statements on social media about customers being forced to change providers or the transaction to the new provider not going smoothly.
Dianne Russell, president of the Flin Flon and District Chamber of Commerce, says she is willing to give Bell MTS the opportunity to prove itself.
“We get a little more choice now because now we have Telus as well as Bell, which is different,” she said. “Before, it was MTS or nothing, but fundamentally, there is little difference between Telus and Bell. I haven’t heard a lot of complaints, but we’re yet to see an improvement in internet services.”
Russell says she has in the past lobbied the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to ensure service is improved for residents in northern Manitoba.
She says effective mobile phone and internet service is a necessity if the region’s businesses and industry are to compete internationally.
Sawatzky says Bell MTS is also in the process of expanding and upgrading the province-wide wireless LTE network to LTE-Advanced.
“[This program] will double the current wireless data speeds,” he said. “We are on track to have about 90 per cent of the network upgrade completed by the end of this year.”
