CRTC directs NorthwesTel to justify its pricing for bandwidth services to other providers
From http://nnsl.com/northern-news-services/stories/papers/jan11_12crtc.html
Justify pricing, CRTC says - NorthwesTel told to publish rates for its V-Connect service and prepare cost studies
Thandiwe Vela - Northern News Services - January 11, 2012 - SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
NorthwesTel Inc. has been ordered by The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to publish the rates for its V-Connect backbone connectivity service, following a complaint of unfair pricing filed by Yellowknife-based Internet service provider SSI Micro Ltd.
The decision, released last Thursday, which requires NorthwesTel to prepare cost studies to justify the service price, is expected to make the rates currently charged for the service "significantly less," SSI chief development officer Dean Proctor said.
"I don't know how it could not be (cheaper)," Proctor said, noting NorthwesTel currently charges SSI Micro up to 30 times, or 3,000 per cent higher, than rates in southern Canada for the service.
"We could not in any way, shape or form figure out how they came to that pricing apart from them trying to not allow us to use it," Proctor said.
SSI Micro filed the application requesting the commission's intervention last June, accusing NorthwesTel - the owner of all fibre and microwave connectivity to the south - of using its position as the sole provider of backbone connectivity services "to eliminate SSI and other Internet providers as competitors in the Yellowknife Internet market."
NorthwesTel argued that there was no basis for SSI Micro's application because the backbone connectivity services fit under the classification of data service which is forborne, meaning the commission does not need to see or approve its pricing.
SSI Micro argued that V-Connect is not foreborne because it is a service that supports voice, data, and video services.
Background - http://www.nnsl.com/frames/newspapers/2011-07/jul27_11ssi.html
SSI Micro accuses NorthwesTel of discriminatory pricing - Complaint filed with CRTC against NorthwesTel and appeals to customers for support
Thandie Vela - Northern News Services - July 27, 2011 SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Yellowknife-based Internet service provider SSI Micro has filed a complaint with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) against NorthwesTel, accusing the telecommunications provider of discriminatory pricing.
To provide retail Internet services in Yellowknife, SSI Micro relies on NorthwesTel -- the owner of all fibre and microwave connectivity to the south -- for the backbone, or "backhaul" services, that connect the local Internet users to the rest of the world. For the service, NorthwesTel charges rates up to 30 times, or 3,000 per cent higher than rates in southern Canada, said Dean Proctor, chief development officer for SSI Micro.
"In the North, people have come to expect a bit of a premium but that does not mean 30 times higher," Proctor said. "It's just a massive disproportion from what pricing should be."
Among the requests in SSI's application to the CRTC, the company is requesting the commission to require NorthwesTel to offer backbone connectivity to Internet service providers operating in the North at no more than twice the market rate in the south.
"There is no question that if NorthwesTel is obliged to lower its backhaul rates to rates we are asking the CRTC to put in place, that consumers will benefit from lower rates from us," Proctor said.