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

[danlee1]

I checked Freedom plan, the plan is $19/mth (digital discount $5/mth), but comes with 1gb 5G data/mth, unlimited calls & texts which is actually a better deal than PM if they moved existing loyalty customers to pay $15/mth and convert points to $$.  What a hassle!!!  This is BS!!!

[ShawnC13]

@LTD2023 I totally sympathize with your situation.  Please don't think I am an employee of Telus or PM as I am just a customer like you.  It is not my service to provide.  I do agree they had great plans here for the lower users who only needed a phone and that the discounts made it an incredibly cheap phone plan.

[LTD2023]

Thank you for the info, I appreciate it. 

[Psygineer]

Definitely! I also learned from a nice private message that it does send targeted offers to existing users and they did get an offer as an existing to go to the $24 plan I used in my example, but sadly my mother didn't get targeted. Maybe because she was on the old Provincial plan at the time. That does make me a little happier though that some of the existing users did get it.

[RetiredGuy1]

I originally posted the following less than an hour ago:

If “greater flexibility” is a value that PM wants to use to promote the new points program, why will they not apply that same guiding value to the availability of plans? At the moment, existing customers cannot get the $24/$29 4G plans but new customers (who never contributed to PMs growth to date) can.

So, it was related to this thread (ie the value of greater flexibility applying to the rewards program but not in plan availabilty). You took my later posts out of context. Ha ha.

[powerserge]

Sorry to hear, think I'm allowed to post this since it's for Telus, the sister company of PM. Here is a cheaper plan to help you out. You get 533 minutes, 1GB of data for both of these per month. However texting is 400 texts per year. This plan is for 1 year also so keep this in mind. Total cost $8.33/month. For texting use whatsapp or one of the social media texting platforms as a solution to the 400 texts. Hope this helps, if this works for you. It's the talk and text 100 plan.

https://www.telus.com/en/mobility/prepaid/plans

[JamJam2]

Actually it was Freedom mobile that started the pricing war. Public Mobile grudgingly had to follow along.

[Coryl1]

Got my bonus loyalty data today. 5GB that expires in 150 days? That doesn't sound very loyal from Public Mobile when I've been here for 5 years and barely use all of the 250mb I buy each month.

You guys really are trying to push people out of the 15/month plan too. 5% on a $15 is 0.75 points per month (or 9pts/year), hardly the same as a $2 loyalty for pre-authorizing for 30-day plans with a card.

I also see minimal communication about how my existing loyalty is being respected by points. Am I starting from nothing? Are you converting my 5 years of loyalty to equivalent points? Are they going to recur at the same rate (monthly)?

"I still have leftover rewards from the old program that I want to use - do I lose these rewards? No, you won’t lose any leftover rewards from the old program. Any credits earned up to May 2024 will remain on your account and be applied to your future bills." This is vague and non-specific. The rewards I've earned from the old system account to $6/month, but I highly doubt you'll allow me to have 6 points per month when I earn <1pt with the payment, 10pts/year and haven't referred any friends. You're bringing the value of my loyalty from $72/year (6 bucks a month) down to $19/year (19pts/year: 0.75 for each month's payment = 9pts, 10pts for staying for another year). It also reads as if I have no choice but to spend those old rewards on "future bills" instead of any other options.

Most of the points are coming from referrals and community engagement, which feels like a quick way to turn into an MLM and get overboarded with spam. This is especially true with the silly gambling aspect of using points to enter contests.

The reason I left competitors like Virgin Mobile was because I got tired of trying to be roped into a club, as if being a customer meant I wanted to join a virtual country club. All I want is a no-to-low frills mobile provider to have text messages, options for roaming, and mobile data. PM is overcomplicating things.

Also? The Points Catalogue is a broken link on the help page because the links are apparently case sensitive. Get it together. I can't even preview what I can "buy" with the points before you force me to it, and finding the most relevant "catalogue" page just says the same information about 1pt=$1 but nothing about how much different features/add-ons cost. I need to navigate to the My Rewards subdomain, which I'm hesitant to click through on because I don't want to convert to the points until the last day possible.

No matter what benefits Public Mobile tries to market under this system, nothing will be as valuable to a customer as money in their pocket.

RIP to those sweet, sweet dollars I saved each month. They have added up a lot since I joined December 2019.

[dariovitale]

With the new points plan I am willing to bet, and you can all check, that when you calculate your final monthly bill after rewards given before taxes, same calling and texting plans even ff gb amount is not exactly the same but very close against plans offered by Bell's Virgin and Lucky Mobile, Rogers Fido and Videotron's Fizz and Freedom Mobile you just might notice only a $1-3 difference. And if so, knowing that Bell, Virgin, Rogers, Fido, Freedom and Koodo ALL HAVE call centers you can CALL to speak with a rep right away might just be worth the switch cause in 2024 this business of almost, if not in some cases, waiting a day for a pm rep to respond to your private messages is just over time consuming for the very little savings we see against plans currently offered by the above mentioned. 

I still a have a single line with PM that highly will be cancelled if they go ahead with the rewards changes. 

In terms of family plans bundled with other home and office services single account services like PM, Lucky Mobile, Virgin, Fido, Fizz and Freedom are usually not worth it. 

I am a old ADT home alarm customer. Telus bought them years ago. With Telus I have another 5 cell phone lines in my family. So for a home alarm and multi cell line bundle I pay $20 a month for home alarm (3 times they replaced my system for free upgrades) and pay $20 a month per cell line. Each cell line has CAN-US Calls and texts with 50gb data to be used in both countries with free roaming. I got that deal in November cause in November and December for Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals that is when these companies really give good deals. I know this by experience over the years. 

[hTideGnow]

haha @RetiredGuy1 then you are on the wrong thread. Start one your own instead

A lot of time,  PM will leave the new activation only restriction on plans and let us all change to that. Keep an eye and other cheaper plans might come

With huge upset here, I think they will let us choose those plans soon

[RetiredGuy1]

I realize that. I was referring to the lack of flexibility in choosing a plan only and not commenting on the rewards subject

[LTD2023]

Not to give a sob story or go off topic but, here is the reason why I chose public mobile. As a person on a limited income(c.p. disability) I ended up needing to have a cell phone to call wheel trans when I needed to get my ride home from appoinments. As well as for any emergencies when I was out. A kind friend gave me her old phone when she upgraded. Looking around, Public mobile was the cheapest provider out there for my needs. $15 a month. They were cheaper than my landline, even before the 'rewards' kicked in. So, out with the old and in with Public Mobile. I just needed a simple phone for communications and you provided that for me. I have never had a problem with your service. The last few years have been challenging, everything going up except my income. You have no idea how much I relied on, and appreciated the rewards to help with my bill. I have had to rely on the food bank to help put food on my table, so saving $7.00 a month might not be a big deal to most people, but it sure has helped me I tell you. I know I will have to eventually get a newer device. (Another hurdle I will have to figure out). Losing these rewards is a real kick in the butt. I would love to stay loyal to public mobile but in my situation and losing the rewards, I have to leave for a cheaper service.

[hTideGnow]

hi @RetiredGuy1 you cannot keep your bonus data of you move down anyway

$34 is a good plan.  

[JohnDong]

Really? deleting any comments regarding competition deals? your offer sucks rn, and bye

[RetiredGuy1]

$34 50 gb/5G which is more data than I need (or $ I want to spend). I’d like to move to either the $24/$29 4G plans but they’re only available to new customers. The only other cheaper plans are 3G which are not of interest to me

[hTideGnow]

hi @danlee1 the $2 autopay and $1 per month for over 1 year and upto $5 is gone

but the $1 friend referrals per friend stays, but will be pay as point 

[danlee1]

are u not rewarding existing customers with their current rebate ($2 off/mth if using credit card, $1 off/mth for referral, $1 off/mth for staying over a year loyalty)?

[hTideGnow]

hi @RetiredGuy1 what plan you have now??

[RetiredGuy1]

To a 3G plan? No thanks

[hTideGnow]

hi @RetiredGuy1 technically you can move down the plan, there is no contract here 

of course, PM should do better to let people move down the plan or make it non expiring 

[micagagne]

Actually, they did offer a small discount, but only for 6 months.  Not sure if it's worth it, I've 3 other lines in my household.

[hTideGnow]

hi @dariovitale I agree that, thats why they have room to retire the old system

SFor 5% points., that is still better than nothing.  Some people are mad and decide to go away.  But I think this is just irrational move, not aove that follow the wallet 

[dariovitale]

Truth is that for single accounts (no family bundles) Telus still makes their PM plans much more attractive than even their own Telus and Koodo branded plans which also beats Bell's and Rogers branded and their flanker brands Virgin, Lucky and Fido mobile plans most of the times and usually the first to start a new pricing and plan marketing war campaign. 

[RetiredGuy1]

True, but those other telecom companies are not forcing their existing customers to pay more for what they already have without the “greater flexibilty” to choose a lower cost plan in order to offset the increased cost from the forced change to the new rewards program

[ShawnC13]

@ridgeline, I don't know honestly, right now that thread is like this one.  Very directional one way as we continue to raise the concerns posted in here.

[hTideGnow]

hi @micagagne I have to agree they won't change.  Even bigger businesses with rewards system change won't reverse the decision, I don't see why they will.  Best to to drag them to sweeten the migration offers a bit

[ShawnC13]

@dariovitale I can only imagine how many messages are in the inboxes right now which unfortunately is probably affecting people with service issues right now.  I know as of yesterday J_PM was in the thread reading and would acknowledge posts with a Bravo.  That is how is has always been dealt with in the Oracle section that if you got a bravo the point had been read and acknowledge.  The actualy PM staff, not CSA didn't have much time before this thread to read through the community, I am sure that there is far less time now with all the Direct Messages and I would think the start of responding to CCTS files.

[micagagne]

They will not revert the changes (from a cs agent).  So far, the best option I've seen is with pc mobile, their 5g plan is cheaper by $5 than pm. (for 25gb)

[ridgeline]

@ShawnC13 Thanks for highlighting subscriber concerns for us in the Oracle area.  Do you have any indication from your connections at Public as to when they will start responding to concerns raised in this board?  It has now been one week since the announcement and radio silence from @J_PM and others at Public.

[ShawnC13]

@Psygineer totally agree open these plans up now to existing customers,  If PM is saying they are only for new customers they need to look at it like retaining anyone they can from this change as a new customer.