Upcoming Changes to our Old Rewards Program

[J_PM]

Hey Community,

We have an important announcement to share with our subscribers who are currently enrolled in our old Rewards program.

We’re making changes to our rewards program and are sharing how these changes impact some of our subscribers. Starting in May, we’ll be retiring our old Rewards program and moving all subscribers to our Public Points™ program. 

We launched the Public Points™ program in January 2022 to provide our subscribers with more ways to earn and spend rewards, with greater flexibility. As part of our commitment to continuously evolve our products and services, it's time to retire our old Rewards program and shift our focus on enhancing our Points program.

To show our appreciation for your continued loyalty, subscribers on our old Rewards program will receive a special thank you. We'll send you a text message when it has been added to your account by March 31st. 

We’re excited to continue providing you, our valued subscribers, more opportunities to earn and spend rewards with Public Points™ moving forward.

To learn more about your move to Public Points, check out our FAQ here.

The Public Mobile Team

[Korth_]

I just ordered a new SIM card from somewhere. And another from somewhere else.

To be ready to catch a good deal when I see it. I'll wait until May to see what happens. But somehow I expect there'll be a rush that I want to stay ahead of.

[Tilo]

I disagree with this change. 

My service bill will go up $4-5 a month due to this change. 

The advertising was clearly stating that we can stay on the reward system unless inactive account.

Please take this as my formal attempt to rectify the situation before a CCTS complain 

[mike7095sk1]

its unfortunate but predictable, the least they could do is give us access to the 24 dollar 4gig 4g plan. I guess there is nothing really motivating for people to stick around with public mobile, but I'm sure chat r and lucky mobile won't give us a compelling reason to switch, but you never know.  

[chra1n]

so disappointed. Why not give compensation that really means something? Didn’t even get a warning email

[Skaliger]

What a terrible decision to forcing your loyal customers switch towards the Point system... We all know that points are worse than the original Rewards scheme.

It was also mentioned previously, the old system will continue to work until your account is active. Now, PM changes rules and doesn't honor their words and loyal customers. Filing CCTS complaint is a good idea as PM's current move is like a backstabbing.

And if it won't work after all, the other providers would be glad to have my business. It was a good 5 year run.

[mc60]

Considering the barebones service, volte whitelist, and lack of wifi calling, slow and buggy site, trashing of add ons, and now trashing of rewards, the value has gone down significantly.

The rewards was pretty much the only thing keeping me with Public Mobile in light of the Volte whitelist (despite having compatible phone) and no wifi calling. My wife already jumped ship and is much happier with incoming calls not sporadically going to voicemail with no notification. VoLTE and WiFi calling doing its job. 

I manage several accounts under the old system, for personal use, family use, IoT use, android auto use, that are no longer cost effective, and several of them will be terminated.

The competitor's service does not whitelist volte, has wifi calling, and includes much more data than the $15 plan.

Dual sim is the way. Sucks that international eSIMs roaming into Canada for data can be cheaper than local.

[Anwbear]

That's horrible blow to loyal customers who were on the old system, many will have to pay more per month now. 

Hope PM is letting the old rewards System stay

[Soon-ex-PM-user]

Fair enough they can change the agreement if they wish. I really thought they are different from Bell or Rogers.

Also if they now can converting to points system then they can easily later on change the terms of its own current point system.  Instead of redeeming 1 point for $1 off,  it is 2 points for $1 off.  Or instead of 10 points reward annually, it is 5 points etc.

[SeniorCitizen]

Just keep in mind, everyone. 

I worked for a major retailer that had a fantastic loyalty program. 

What happens, a lot of loyal customers will accumulate them. Then the company sees that as a huge liability. So The first step is to dilute them by reducing their value. We did it AirMiles did it. BMO did it. 

Any loyalty program will never be good forever. 

And on the Telus points. I had no idea I had them. I contacted 5 friends and 3 of them had no idea either. 

My daughters never look at the bill or login to download it. Therefore not informed about points. They pay the number that they see on the email. 

[dannycdee]

Alternatively for low-budget customers like myself Freedom mobile has good deals for new customers. And they offer wifi-calling on all plans (something I need as I have terrible mobile network reception at home).

[fixin]

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@NotABot wrote:

Could someone explain how exactly the point based system can reduce the monthly fee as comparing to the legacy reward program that can reduce monthly plan of $15 down to $8 after accumulating all the rewards? The new point based program seems to only give points and not reducing the monthly fee automatically. So the user has to use the points to reduce the monthly fee manually? Otherwise, if the user forgot, then the regular fee stays and points get accumulated and eventually wiped out after 150 days? But if the user can still log in and manually use the points, it is still same low monthly bill as before?

The key is to reduce monthly payment automatically! Anything affecting this is a reduced service. I hope this forced point based program can be reversed and the legacy reward program can be grandfathered. Loyal customer can stay happy and introduce PM to new family members.

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It ain't ideal if you already have the $2 autopay & the $1 refer-a-friend rewards.

You will have to accumulate 15 points to redeem them as credits towards your next bill.

The 240GB of free data has to be wiped within 150 days to get all of it worth. So you will need to use at least 1.6GB - 2GB of data (Not including your plan's data)

[SeniorCitizen]

Doesn’t PM have a catalogue of non PM products? I thought  it did. 
To me it makes most sense to deposit any reward $ value back in, to reduce your next bill. 

I will PM you. 

[Wolfcore]

I responded to somebody in a dm about this, so i'll just copy/paste it here:

Yup, I commented on that line in another post. As you can see, they're making contradictory statements, so it'll really be up to CCTS to decide. The same situation happened back in 2018, and due to enough complaints, they ended up reversing their decision based on that writing (and the outrage).

That line is also very vague, and due to the statement made before it, one could argue that they're referring to "changing" the reward system moving forward (but not removing what people have already earned previously). 

Regardless, it's the best evidence we have, and it's written on their own forum.

[fixin]

@Chalupa_Batman - I hear some people ranked up 400 points on Telus home services to get eGift Cards.

Yes, Telus Mobility doesn't have points yet, it may be coming soon!

[NotABot]

Could someone explain how exactly the point based system can reduce the monthly fee as comparing to the legacy reward program that can reduce monthly plan of $15 down to $8 after accumulating all the rewards? The new point based program seems to only give points and not reducing the monthly fee automatically. So the user has to use the points to reduce the monthly fee manually? Otherwise, if the user forgot, then the regular fee stays and points get accumulated and eventually wiped out after 150 days? But if the user can still log in and manually use the points, it is still same low monthly bill as before?

The key is to reduce monthly payment automatically! Anything affecting this is a reduced service. I hope this forced point based program can be reversed and the legacy reward program can be grandfathered. Loyal customer can stay happy and introduce PM to new family members.

[CMaley]

I hate to tell you this but the large print giveth and the small print taketh away...

Other Reward Rules

• Public Mobile reserves the right to change all Rewards at its sole discretion and without advance notice.
• The Community Reward offer is subject to the reservation rights of Moderation as described in the Community Terms of Service.

That being said if they don't reverse it myself and my wife will just be changing phone companies. It's an excuse for us to upgrade to more faster data for less as we will be new costumers for another provider and can get those promotions.  PM doesn't let us have those promotions so it feels like they don't want us as customers anymore.  I just wish that this came out around boxing day so that we could get better promos!

[Chalupa_Batman]

GC is gift cards. He said that Telus gave points that could be used for gift cards purchases towards Telus. But I never heard of points system on Telus mobile. If I had points and wasn't told about them, wow. But good news is that Winback tried to call me yesterday. Sadly the call got dropped...  while on Public Mobile... LMAO...  I'm sure they will call back and I'll ask about them.

BTW @SeniorCitizen , when is that picture from you tinted red on? Recent or older?

[MilanJq]

Nice one 👍 but I think PC mobile is the way to go because I doubt fizz is going to have the same coverage

[SeniorCitizen]

Not sure what GC means?

If referring to points that Telus gives….i am lucky to get $25 a year. And can’t put towards a bill credit unless 1 year apart. The new PM awards is very similar to the Telus rewards. So not sure of your point. 

Now if you received 1 point worth $2 for a referral  (for ever)  for those of us on the old rewards…..let’s talk. 

[ShawnC13]

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@Camera4617 wrote:

There you go, another Oracle is defending PM.. Please, don't.. 

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How was it defending PM?  He said do what is best for you, and lets hope PM figures a way to make points better.  It is unfortunate that Oracle thread is out of main Community.  This has community has how many member and there is over 911 posts on this thread now.  The Oracle thread in our area for the 8 of us is over 100 posts as well and not one is defending this decision by PM.

[ShawnC13]

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@Chalupa_Batman wrote:

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@NDesai wrote:

Let's hope PM figures out a way to make the points system more valuable. Just as Telus offers GC purchase using points, I hope PM offer something similar. 

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I'm sorry...  say what now? Telus offers GC purchase using points? I was with Telus for the last 3 years before I ported that line to PM last Monday and I've never heard of this point thing you speak of. 

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@Chalupa_Batman, on my home services I have with Telus I earn points each month.  I am not sure if it is the same with their mobile services.

[Asbnorris]

PM, me, all my family members and friends will 100% leave you if you go through with this. Make the right decision and don’t f*ck over your loyal customers.  

[Camera4617]

There you go, another Oracle is defending PM.. Please, don't.. 

[Chalupa_Batman]

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@NDesai wrote:

Let's hope PM figures out a way to make the points system more valuable. Just as Telus offers GC purchase using points, I hope PM offer something similar. 

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I'm sorry...  say what now? Telus offers GC purchase using points? I was with Telus for the last 3 years before I ported that line to PM last Monday and I've never heard of this point thing you speak of. 

[golfball]

Right now PM may appear to be the lowest cost but I would imagine the competition are watching closely... we may be seeing some new promos when the rewards go away.

[NDesai]

Totally understand the frustration on here. Nobody likes the new Points system because it doesn't offer the same value. If I refer back to when the points system was introduced to Oracles, the first questions we asked them if they will force everyone to switch. They didn't have a clear idea at that time, but we all knew it will bite us at some point, most importantly the loyal customers. They had plenty of time to prepare and now the points system is taking over. On top this, they offered a data add-on when most customers are on a higher data plans. It's an insulting offer imo since it also has an expiry and locked to the current plan. 

I suggest you all make the best choice. Everyone here is trying to get the best deal. If PM is becoming costly, you are free to make your own decision based on what's out there. Where else we get any kind of rewards? While it won't be the same, most customers are on a best deal and they will still earn a little bit of rewards. 

Let's hope PM figures out a way to make the points system more valuable. Just as Telus offers GC purchase using points, I hope PM offer something similar. 

[FY]

This is way to fight!

[Mapleleafer]

We can lobby together to get them to reverse this awful decision.

If they ignore it and don’t they will lose in the long run.

Myself and others who were loyal to Public will be gone, speaking with our wallets if ignored.  Simple as that = Public Bankrupt

[dannycdee]

@J_PM 
I saved the official email I got from Public Mobile on Jan 24, 2022, how are you going to work your way out of this one?

[fixin]

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@Mapleleafer wrote:

I have messaged CS_Agent requesting to stay on the current legacy rewards system I am on.

I have told them if they cannot keep me on it then I will be submitting a complaint to the CCTS and asked them how they will be handling that request.

I suggest everyone the same situation do the same.

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Spoiler

Spoiler

Yes, file a CCTS complaint. 1600 people = 1/4 of a million in losses because 1 complaint = $140 to the phone carrier - in this case - Public Mobile (Telus)