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Upcoming Changes to our Old Rewards Program

J_PM
Public Mobile
Public Mobile

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

5,410 REPLIES 5,410

saturna
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

@fixin wrote:

@sa7375 - Probably to not entice customers because the $15/month plan is $180 annually.

Freedom does seem like the #1 provider for annual plans, despite that they don't have the ability for all Canadians to have it yet for their MVNO service.

$99/year talk & text = $8.25/month.

$119/year talk, text, 15GB = $9.92/month.

$149/year talk, text, 30GB = $12.42/month.

Those plans are crazy cheap (If you live in the Freedom Coverage.)


Just a word of caution: The $99 is incoming calls, outgoing calls and incoming text only. If you use tradional SMS (at 160 characters each) more than once a day average, you are better off with the $119 plan. The later is still <$10 for considerably more features than PM offers for $15...

RetiredGuy1
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

@upandadam 

And the replies have more than doubled since that article was published 👍

fixin
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

@Public_Cust_17 - Yeah, they do operate tiny bits on the Rogers network (Now called as phase 2 MVNO expansion) it just gets those little dead spots in the Freedom Network and somewhat streamlines the network out.

If you check their coverage map and switch between LTE / 3G and 5G / Extended range LTE (MVNO Freedom) it just has slightly better coverage.

I am also in the 4G / LTE coverage zone as there is two Freedom Stores in my City.

I will have to stay as I am on the points system with going to the states for free last year with that system.

RetiredGuy1
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

@sa7375 wrote:

@upandadam  Sadly, it's not getting the attention where it needs most — at the PM. 😄


@sa7375 

Well, there’s different ways of looking at that. Will this growing backlash be enough for PM to reconsider this change? Realistically, not likely. But, will it plant a seed of doubt for any future changes that would again impact their customer base in a negative manner? It might. As the proverb goes “Nothing ventured, nothing gained”.

Public_Cust_17
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

@fixin   according to what I was able to find Freedom seems to be a core mobile operator vs. a mobile virtual network operator.. Wikipedia, so I guess that depends on how much you trust the info there.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mobile_network_operators_in_Canada

For myself, I found out that I am solidly in their 4G LTE coverage area so that works in my case.. https://www.freedommobile.ca/en-CA/network-coverage

A couple of years ago I wouldn't even have given them a look but with the sale of Freedom to Quebecor  that was completed on April 3, 2023 and the ability to roam at no charge was introduced.. I've decided to try them out since Public Mobile seems to have no interest in retaining my business... who knows, maybe Telus/PM puts reputation above profits but I'll not be holding my breath in May..  😉

fixin
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

@sa7375 - Probably to not entice customers because the $15/month plan is $180 annually.

Freedom does seem like the #1 provider for annual plans, despite that they don't have the ability for all Canadians to have it yet for their MVNO service.

$99/year talk & text = $8.25/month.

$119/year talk, text, 15GB = $9.92/month.

$149/year talk, text, 30GB = $12.42/month.

Those plans are crazy cheap (If you live in the Freedom Coverage.)

Public_Cust_17
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

@sa7375   I hadn't really thought of that as I rarely check my rear-view mirror once I've decided to move on but since you asked, yes if I'm able to still sign on here and post an update I will.  🙂

sa7375
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

Annual Plan-3.jpeg
Does anyone, insider or otherwise, has an idea why PM seems not inclined to offering Annual plans? 

sa7375
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

@Public_Cust_17  I appreciate your strategy for picking up a monthly, before signing up for the yearly plan, and will keenly look forward to your experience/feedback with the new carrier. I hope you will keep us informed. 

Public_Cust_17
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

@Tav2   it's Freedom Mobile and although some have voiced their opinion that their network is no good, Mobile Syrup's review of them seems more credible to me. 

https://mobilesyrup.com/2023/10/26/testing-freedom-mobile-5g-network-canada/

sa7375
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

@upandadam  Sadly, it's not getting the attention where it needs most — at the PM. 😄

Tav2
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

Which company is this?

upandadam
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

We are gaining attention at the very least. 

Mobile Syrup Link 

Public_Cust_17
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

@Community_QA    so to summarize, PM doesn't give a $#%)($#% about it's loyal customers,  they'll make even more profit taking away your rewards.. most people will stay.

I respectfully disagree with your statement "Let me tell you a sad fact, May will come quick and you will have no choice but stuck with Public Points.".. April will come, my last billing with the current rewards will be automatically taken and I'll turn off the auto-pay then I'll no longer be loyal to PM. In May my choice will be to take my new found freedom and to try out a competitor with a $19/month plan with unlimited talk and text and 1 GB of data on a 4G LTE connection (all things PM doesn't seem to want to offer) and if that works even half decently I'll switch to their yearly $119 plan where I'll get a block of 15GB of data for the year which frankly makes more sense to me because some months I use more data and some I use less. The yearly plan there will save me $$$ vs the lowest bare bones plan that PM will then be offering.  I've stayed with PM because of the savings and now I'll go where ever I can save the most for a basic plan because that is all I need.    Cheers

RetiredGuy1
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

“Problem with forum and review sites is that people only come here to express their frustration”

What exactly is the problem with that? An announcement was posted in a community forum and people are posting their reaction to that. Your thesis on what the posters here represent is based on a lot of assumptions and is somewhat of a moot point anyway as I don’t believe the majority actually believe PM will reverse their decision. I think its more a matter of venting frustration and if that can expand beyond the echo chamber of this forum, then an added sense that their voices are at least being heard. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

G_Pomzz
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

Screenshot_2024-03-23-23-43-23-732_com.android.chrome-edit.jpg

 Strange... they offer a decent customer retention plan, and then blink, it disappears 

upandadam
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

PC Mobile (Has Wifi Calling too)

Fizz Mobile, their Beta plans let you choose the data you need and is flexible. 

Community_QA_
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

@JDBlue1966 

I am just a customers like many here.  I have Public Mobile for years and I have multiple accounts already enjoyed $7 off for years.  

Am I angry?  Why I need to?  It is just business.  I am not falling in love with PM or Telus.  If I find a cheaper plan that makes sense and I have time to go through the trouble to move, I will too (yes, it is easy and quick to port, not much effort)

@RetiredGuy1  wrong guess, I am not him and I am no Telus or PM staff

 

RetiredGuy1
Town Hero / Héro de la Ville

Thanks for your input Mr. Entwistle

JDBlue1966
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

Not being funny, but what are you on about? Most of us are just angry about being shafted. Hope that clears things up. Its jus that simple.

G_Pomzz
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

PM should hire you as a business analyst 🤣🤣

Community_QA_
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

Sorry, Defeat and Truth are both hard to swallow, but be prepared.. 

Community_QA_
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

In this second part of the post, I am going to tell you why the immediate departure would in fact a welcome move to Telus and won’t threaten Telus' strong financial foundation. In fact, it will help to strengthen next year’s Telus' financial statement.

A recap from last post. There are 750,000 Public Mobile subscribers, 300,000 account still on the old rewards system, and 6.6% (20,000) of the accounts will be leaving Public Mobile before or shortly after May.

There was a post mentioned that the $25 is the average plan price for those who are planning to leave. That is a lot of money, 20000 x $25 = $500,000. That is half a million a month!!

But as we all know, most of these people are not paying the full price. There are at least $7 off and some are more with friend referrals to knock the price down further. But let’s forget the friend referral for now. ($25 -7 ) * 20000 = $360,000. That is still over 1/3 of the million per month and $4.3 million annually on the financial statement

Now, let's focus on the “saving” Telus enjoy for those who stay. There are 280,000 will be staying and won’t move away immediately.  As said above, Telus is now saving $7 per month per account. Adding back the anniversary rewards (10 points, around $0.83 per month) and the 5% (average plan price $25 * 0.05 = 1.25 points), that will be around $4.92 saving per month per account. With 280,000 accounts, the total saving would be 1.377 million/month or $16.5 million annually!!!
$16.5 millions saved but subtract back the $4.3 million lost from people leaving, Telus still gain $12.2 million.  And I want to remind you, with the infrastructure already setup, each new subscription and each dollar saved on the current level is basically a profit. So, expect to see a $12.2 million saving from PM alone on the next year’s Telus financial statement

Some might ask where is the $120 fees for each CCTS complaints?  $120 is not for us who to keep our $7 savings forever, but is that sufficient to Telus?  If there are only 20000 immediate accounts going to leave from the anger (irrational move), I don't see the number will be any more than that.  $120 x 20,000 is $2.4 million.  That is a lot to me.  But this is a one time expense to Telus.  Next years profile might be just $14.1 million, but the year after will go back to $16.5 million

So, people asked why Telus decided to axe the old rewards system? Reason is simple, it makes sense financially. You guys can leave but it is certainly that not all 300,000 on the old rewards system will leave from this change. The savings outbalance the lost.

People might ask why not later?  Because it probably reached an optimal point.  People with just $2 loyalty + $2 autopay might still able to find a good deal to go.  Those enjoying $3+$2  and above probably won't move no matter what.   There are not enough account departures to justify a further wait.  And the longer Telus does not make the change, the more accounts will reach the maximum $7 savings and even harder for these accounts to leave on their own.  

And some here were so excited to receive an email from CCTS confirming the complain was accepted. Tell you the truth, as long as you follow the procedure and did everything they asked (try to work with PM for a solution first and fail), they will accept the complaint. Acceptance does not mean you won. In fact, a decision in favour of Telus is coming

Good Luck to you all.

Community_QA_
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

I have waited another week and come back and see any update and any new idea from this thread. Spent another 2 hours reading everything, sadly no great news other than some naïve thinking and suggestions

And I see some people are so excited seeing 3300 replies here, thinking this is the most replied thread ever on this site. Some were pumped thinking their posts here, their threat to leave, their CCTS complains, their email to the Standing Committee on Industry and Technology, their attempt to get media attention will bring them back the old system. Let me tell you a sad fact, May will come quick and you will have no choice but stuck with Public Points.  Any many of those who said they will leave will quietly stay and enjoy the 5% savings the new system gives you

First, lets look at how powerful the responses here.

Problem with forum and review sites is that people only come here to express their frustration. How often people with compliment or no stance will come and make a post? Maybe 99% are complains and only 1% are complimentary posts, but that does not mean 99% of the customers are overall unsatisfied with the service. On contrary, it is quite the opposite. There can still be 99% satisfied customers out there (or at least no comment) and only 1% have the problem. So, the moment you see 3000+ replies, do not think you are the majority. And in fact, you are still the minority

Let’s check how many subscribers PM has at the moment. The last Telus report shows Telus has more than 10 million mobile phone subscribers, added 400,000 net additions in Q4 alone.
Trouble with Telus financial statement is that it does not break down the numbers, Telus, Koodo and Public Mobile are all blend together. But that does not mean we cannot find it out ourselves from the market trend

Both Rogers and Bell disclose the Prepaid and Postpaid subscription number. Prepaid accounts makes up around 9.2%-10.6% of the total. We will stick with the mean, 10%. So, there should be around 1 million of Postpaid subscribers Telus has. But, Telus and Koodo also have Postpaid subscribers, except the number would not be big. So, Public Mobile should have around 3/4 of the pie, so it is around 750,000
Before Jan 2022, 100% will be on old system. Since then, 100% of the new subscribers will be on Public Points. Don’t underestimate the new subscription number. Public Mobile has been doing extremely well in the past 2 years, especially with last Black Friday and Boxing Day, They certainly bring in lots of new subscribers with its Canada-US plan as well as the $34 Canada only plan.
At the same time, many on the old rewards system left PM because they cannot get those deals (new activation only) So, the inflow to Public Points together with the outflows from old rewards has change the tide successfully. Public Points members is now outnumbered those in the old system. I would take a conservative count of 40-60 split (old-new). In fact, the difference should be bigger. With that, there should only be 300,000 out of 750,000 still on the old rewards

After we confirmed the base number on the old rewards system, we can see how powerful this thread is. 3000 replies is 1% of the base. But we all know some posts multiple times here, pretty much repeated the same post, so, there are no more than 1000 people who replied. That would make it just 0.3% of the base

Yes, one would remind me that many have multiple family accounts as well. Let’s say each respondent have 4 household accounts here, the 1000 people will represent the voice of 4000 accounts.
One will also remind me that many people are “shy” and not bother to reply at all. So, If there are 1000 very frustrated and “non-shy” people here, there might be another 4000 shy and frustrated one out there, and those 4000 “non-shy” could manage another 4 accounts each. So, we have 5000 people (and 20000 account altogether) very frustrated and ready to leave any time. 20,000 out of 300,000 is 6.6% of the base

How about those not very frustrated and don’t bother to answer? The change in rewards really not bother them enough and these are people who won’t leave immediately. So, they are not an immediate thread to Telus. They might leave one day, but in this business, people come and go for different reasons, and these people are simply part of that group, it is part of this business

Now, the picture is clear. Out of this 3000 posts, there are only around 1000 people here, representing roughly 20,000 account, 6.6% of the total. Don’t get too thrived that there are so many replies here and thought you are showing Telus the power of people. There is no power here at all.

Other numbers
Redflagdeals: 867 replies
Reddit: has around 750 replies across couple similar posts
Change.org: 87 signatures (the one about $10 price plan, affected less people and still managed to get 122 signatures)

Tav2
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

PC Mobile looks like it could be good fit for me. 

Screenshot 2024-03-23 9.44.25 PM.png

G_Pomzz
Model Citizen / Citoyen Modèle

@Tav2  you and probably 1,000's of others.

The legacy rewards program is near and dear to the hearts of long time subscribers. Taking it away is like losing your best friend! The "bonus gift" of data (with a short expiry date) is a slap in the face. 

Burdwood
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

@Tav2 wrote:

I've used 3.67gb of 20gb with 3 days left to my plan with a change to the 50gb plan pending because it was the same price. Theres absolutely NO WAY I can utilize the 240gb loyalty bonus unless I just leave YouTube streaming all day for the fun of it. Getting boned here losing the old system and this bonus makes no sense. With my $13 in bonus rewards a month now gone its just not worth it anymore. Can't even switch to a 4gb plan because its new activations only. Its been a good run Public but I'm gonna be switching carriers ASAP unless something changes. 


They never intended it to be usable, it's just lipstick on the pig.

That generous data gift is only there so that they can say, "But we DO care, we gave you all that free data! How come you didn't use it in time?"

Burdwood
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

Will I lose my special bonus data if I switch plans?

The bonus data will remain active unless your account becomes inactive, you switch to a plan of lower value or to an incompatible plan.



So, considering that there are still payment glitches, and therefore accounts sometimes are going into suspenssion unintendedly, Public Mobile is taking the bonus data away due to their own incapability to offering proper service??? 

I mean, linking the add-on to the plan is bad enough, putting an arbitrary expiry on it is stupid, but taking it away because PM is incompetent, is crazy messed up.

Really, PM if you don't want us to use "free data", just don't give it to us.

Tav2
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

I've used 3.67gb of 20gb with 3 days left to my plan with a change to the 50gb plan pending because it was the same price. Theres absolutely NO WAY I can utilize the 240gb loyalty bonus unless I just leave YouTube streaming all day for the fun of it. Getting boned here losing the old system and this bonus makes no sense. With my $13 in bonus rewards a month now gone its just not worth it anymore. Can't even switch to a 4gb plan because its new activations only. Its been a good run Public but I'm gonna be switching carriers ASAP unless something changes. 

Burdwood
Good Citizen / Bon Citoyen

@Tav2 wrote:

Does anyone know if I change my 5G plan to a cheap 3G plan with low data will I lose my 150 day bonus data? They only way for me to actually use the bonus data and save some money is to switch to a lower tier plan until that runs out and then switch back to a more appropriate plan later. 


As of 2024 PM is not interested in allowing you to optimize your plan in your favour. 

As per T&C linked in the original post, you lose the expiring "Loyalty Add-on" if you downgrade your plan. I've seen a few posts in the community that confirm that it's actually happening.

Need Help? Let's chat.