A Canadian Telecom Giant Is Planning To Charge Customers More For Paying By Credit Card

By Janice Rodrigues, Trending Associate Editor

Heads up, Telus customers! Your plan might get slightly more expensive in a few months time, thanks to a new fee associated with credit cards.

According to a notice shared with customers, the telecom giant is planning to add a 1.5 per cent processing fee for those using their credit card to pay for services.

This means that customers with a $100 phone bill will be charged an additional $1.50, as well as applicable taxes in their province, with the exception of prepaid accounts and all customers in Quebec.

According to Telus, this will cost the average customer approximately $2 more per bill.

“The fee applies to One-Time and Pre-Authorized Credit Card bill payments,” the company said in a statement to Narcity.

The reason for this increase seems to be to make up for the processing costs that the company incurs when they accept credit card payments.

Telus has stated that this new charge to customers is “not higher than the fee Telus pays to accept credit card payments.”

But here are the good news: there are ways to avoid paying this surcharge. All you’d have to do is change your payment options to one of the following: Pay Through Bank (one-time bank payment), Pre-Authorized Debit (recurring bank payment), Visa Debit, Visa Prepaid or Mastercard Prepaid Cards.

According to CBC, this new charge is not a done deal yet but awaiting the approval of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications (CRTC). The fee is currently planned to be implemented in October, and Telus will give its customers advance notice.

If implemented, it will be yet another cost for Canadians who are already dealing with inflation, higher interest rates and an unstable housing market.

For now, thankfully, we can all breathe easy as there’s no word on other telecom giants following suit.

At the same time, it might be worth looking up the cheapest internet providers based on province.

If this fee applies to you, keep a watch out for this advance notice, and swap out your payment options if you want to avoid this charge altogether.

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• This story was fact-checked