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

[Burdwood]

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@marcnoel wrote:

Just in case there hasn't been enough said about this.

One of the effects (side-effects?) of the Rewards-to-Points switch advisory coming with almost two months' notice is that it gives one time to think about the best course of action.

Points were introduced in January of 2022, so, anyone that joined after that started out with Points. Those people are unaffected by the switch, and some of us may have referrals that started after the Points switch, so they have no reason to leave (regarding this particular subject). Also, I find it hard to believe that NO-ONE started after the switch, because they didn't like that change.

Separately, I have gotten the impression that some people think they can leave PM, and take their rewards/discounts with them to another carrier. For example, if you are on a $ 34.00 PM plan now, and get $ 20.00/month in Rewards, you're paying $ 14.00/month. Do you really expect to jump ship, and go to Koodo, Freedom, etc., and get the same plan for $ 14.00? We all had to earn loyalty over time - five years to get $ 5.00 off per month. Most likely, a person would try a new carrier for a while, to see if it's worth recommending someone to join, so it would take some time to get referrals. You can TRY to switch, and get all your referrals to follow you immediately, but, if you all encounter problems with the new carrier, because you didn't wait to see how things went first, the referrals might not thank you.

I would prefer us to not lose $ 107.20 year in AutoPay and Loyalty discounts, but, it's still cheaper to stay put.

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That depends on your PM plan, where you are, what device you are using.

And I don't think that the comparisons are to the PM plans minus current rewards. Since we'll all be paying full price as of May (points have to be accumulated and manually redeemed once you have a minimum of $15), we are comparing full price at PM with full price at competitor X for the same or better offerings.

Lets say unlimited talk and text plus 1GB of data...  Full price at PM as of May: 12*$25=$300. Compare with Freedom yearly prepaid: $119/15GB/year. That is potential of $181 savings per year. (Yes, that is based on the assumption that you live in Freedom's native coverage. Things are, unfortunately, different for people in rural settings and in the Maritimes.)

Of course, people on the $34/50GB/Can-US plan will have a harder time to find an equal plan at the same / better price somewhere else, so it likely makes sense for them to stay at PM.

If one doesn't have friends on the target provider in the same area that can share their experience, get a prepaid SIM for a month and compare to PM side by side. If all works out and you want to change to the other provider, contact that provider to help you porting your number from PM at around 4 days before the May renewal?

[Public_Cust_17]

@Wolfcore  yeah, an Oracle also removed an "Off Topic" post I made that mentioned it might be an idea to share this decision, that affects their most vulnerable customers disproportionately, with a consumers advocate organization.  Not sure how sharing this information and potentially engaging someone with more influence would be off topic but hey I'm just a lowly customer so what do I know.  😉

[marcnoel]

What next?

"It's my God-given right to spend MORE money!"  Okay.  Help yourself.

I had a client switch to PM, but his phone was so old, it had its own operating system, and we couldn't get it set up.  He got so frustrated that he went back to Telus, for more money, even though we could have gotten it working, then, he bought a new Android phone anyway.  Good thing he's paying more now.  He would've just wasted it on magic beans.

[Markaps]

@Soon-ex-PM-user No US roaming

[hTideGnow]

hi @marcnoel yes, some people want to go just because they are mad, some even said they are willing to pay $10 more for the same thing just because they want to leave.  To me, I think we should follow our wallet

[Wolfcore]

I believe it's the opposite. It's a massive number.

If it were merely a small group of people, they'd probably just leave them grandfathered in. There would be no need to make this big announcement and risk reputational damage, etc.

Public Points only officially launched in 2022, the old rewards program launched in 2015. So the old system had 7 years worth of customers, while the new one has only had 2. Sure, there's some crossover, as some old customers have switched over, and sure, there have been a lot of new customers added recently, but regardless, the amount of people on the old system has to be gigantic. 

Their hope with this announcement is just that they'll make more money by dropping this old program, compared to the amount of money that will be lost via the people who leave due to this announcement. It's really as simple as that. If their prediction is wrong, that's where things will start to get interesting.

[kyle12]

Does anyone have the numbers for how many customers are still on the old rewards program vs total PM customers? Is it such a small percent that they don't care about losing that will be offset by not maintaining 2 reward systems?

[marcnoel]

Just in case there hasn't been enough said about this.

One of the effects (side-effects?) of the Rewards-to-Points switch advisory coming with almost two months' notice is that it gives one time to think about the best course of action.

Points were introduced in January of 2022, so, anyone that joined after that started out with Points. Those people are unaffected by the switch, and some of us may have referrals that started after the Points switch, so they have no reason to leave (regarding this particular subject). Also, I find it hard to believe that NO-ONE started after the switch, because they didn't like that change.

Separately, I have gotten the impression that some people think they can leave PM, and take their rewards/discounts with them to another carrier. For example, if you are on a $ 34.00 PM plan now, and get $ 20.00/month in Rewards, you're paying $ 14.00/month. Do you really expect to jump ship, and go to Koodo, Freedom, etc., and get the same plan for $ 14.00? We all had to earn loyalty over time - five years to get $ 5.00 off per month. Most likely, a person would try a new carrier for a while, to see if it's worth recommending someone to join, so it would take some time to get referrals. You can TRY to switch, and get all your referrals to follow you immediately, but, if you all encounter problems with the new carrier, because you didn't wait to see how things went first, the referrals might not thank you.

I would prefer us to not lose $ 107.20 year in AutoPay and Loyalty discounts, but, it's still cheaper to stay put.

[Wolfcore]

For all of these people who are pretending like 750 unique posters is a small number, I'd love to see how many individual users posted messages in the $40/4gb thread from 2018. A thread that PM ended up reversing a decision based on (among CCTS complaints, and news coverage). For reference, that thread only has 1433 comments, this one has 2800. If @softech could help, that would be great.

Regardless, this thread isn't even finished yet, not even close. The implementation is still weeks away. When subscribers see their first official increase on their credit card statements, that's when the masses will come here (assuming this thread is still around), because we all know most people aren't bothering to read texts or emails from PM. 

Even still, 750 individual people is a massive number to those who know what they're talking about. That number is representative of something far larger.

[RetiredGuy1]

Hi @hTideGnow and @Wolfcore 

Yeah, I hear you both. Using comparable plans as an example, my thinking was if posters could see whats been covered in pinned posts regarding that subject then no need to post the same info themselves over and over and over again

[Soon-ex-PM-user]

For anyone that is current with PM $34 or more plan,  check this out https://mobilesyrup.com/2024/03/16/telecom-news-roundup-rogers-bell-telus-34-50gb-plan-offeringmar-9...

in May 2024,  the $34  plan with PM will cost roughly $34 - ($34*0.05 + 10/12) = $31.45 (for anyone with zero referral)

My stand is still the same  as I stated in the previous post that PM prices will  not be competitive.  Remember we were paying less with PM due to its features lacking and no direct support. 

lol not that hard to calculate and shop around.  Do what is best for you and your situation.   Cheers. 

 * while the $34 plan in the article only for selected areas only but I believe it will open up eventually *

[hTideGnow]

HI @RetiredGuy1 

I guess the only on matters is the announcement itself and the FAQ link there.  The  rest are just personal feelings or comparable plans outside.  But for plans outside, I would check RFD instead

[Wolfcore]

Problem with this is that they're never going to pin messages that aren't pro-PM, so it would just come off as a way of controlling the narrative. But also, there's nothing for them to really pin that's pro-PM either, because the only information that anybody has, is the same information that PM has already sent out via emails/text messages, or is included in the main post/FAQ.

[dabr]

@softech  @HALIMACS    Perhaps, what maybe getting lost in speculating about the number of unique posters, is that those customers also, more than likely, represent at least one other customer whose account they manage and some of these, obviously, represent multiple other customers who will never post here to register their complaint.  Also we know, generally speaking, most customers never come to this community or check their self serve accounts often, so will only pay attention when their payment is much greater than it would normally be starting in May.  

[RetiredGuy1]

Fair enough @HALIMACS , I had no idea of the breakdown between posters/posts but I see that @softech has provided that now.

As its been 2 weeks since the announcement, I believe the lack of any further communication from PM is indirectly breeding the volume of posts. Perhaps its intentional (if they see retention rates are remaining high then why make any concessions) or perhaps they have genuine ideas to enhance the points program. Of course, their plan may be to wait until we’re closer to May in either case. Not expecting specifics at this point but I believe a little more reassurance other than a blanket “shifting our focus” would be appreciated by many.

With ~2,800 posts now it is too cumbersome to see whats been posted hence a lot of duplication. Is it possible to have certain posts pinned (perhaps by the Oracles) to help organize/streamline all the valuable feedback in here?

[Wolfcore]

What does "side chatter" even mean lol? How would one even moderate that? Sounds very subjective. The mods have already been removing the messages that shouldn't be here. If not, this thread probably would have been over 4k posts by now. Lots of spam has been removed, lots of "problematic" messages, etc. Everything else is just people talking about this decision, and the branches that come off of it. Isn't that what a thread it for? What does this person expect? That people are only allowed to post their single complaint message and then just leave? 

Sounds like an ulterior motive to me.

[OldGal]

Thanks for the info. I'm somewhat in the boonies of SW ONT, and didn't know we have LUCKY coverage. I'll be checking it out.

[OldGal]

Some people 'complain', some 'lament'. Lovely. Thanks for the chuckle.

[GF3]

Time to look elsewhere!  What a crappy way to treat loyal customers.  Why offer these discounts if you were just going to take it away.  What a crappy way to run a business.  Good riddens!

[softech]

HI @HALIMACS 

better way than counting  🙂

nono, they are not Oracle only resources, in fact those figures you can access as well  🙂

[HALIMACS]

Whoa @softech , that's excellent to hear.   I was hoping there were more than a few hundred unique users.   (which was a wild guess on my part, admittedly...)

How did you get to that figure?   Counting - or is there another (easier) way to acquire it?

[softech]

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@HALIMACS wrote:

While the number of posts are far in excess of the number of complaints, it is true that there are multiple users with multiple posts on this thread, meaning there are likely only a few hundred unique users on this thread.

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@HALIMACS 

There are around 750 unique posters on this thread.  The top poster on this thread has 150+ posts, and there are some with 65+  🙂

[HALIMACS]

I'm gonna take the middle ground here, @RetiredGuy1 & @Chalupa_Batman 

While the number of posts are far in excess of the number of complaints, it is true that there are multiple users with multiple posts on this thread, meaning there are likely only a few hundred unique users on this thread.

Still, although there is some 'heated' banter back and forth between members (i'll admit, i may have been one of them engaging in this 🤐), I believe the whole thread is pretty much on topic and delves into many aspects of this change and options many are considering and discussing.

I think it's great that PM has kept it unlocked for comments - i just wish they might more actively participate in the thread itself instead of just sitting back 

[RetiredGuy1]

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@Chalupa_Batman wrote:

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@eyes wrote:

After 2,774 REPLIES just may be they will take notice. But who knows ? 

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You have to realize that most of the 2774 posts are side chatter and have nothing to do with this thread. I'm guessing that there are less than 500 legit complaints in this thread. I hate to say it but this thread got way out of control. This should have been moderated from the beginning. Legit complaints stay, side chatter is moved to a different thread and be continued there for legitimacy of our concerns/complaints.

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I wouldn’t suggest most posts are just “side chatter”. The thread is in response to an announcement affecting countless thousands of legacy rewards subscribers with various consequences as a result of the migration and corresponding viewpoints. A good portion of posts relate to comparisons to other telecoms and I believe they’re being made with the intent of being helpful. Isn’t that the underlying principle behind a community forum? 

[Handy1]

I will use up the data  add on my 50GB already used up days ago 

[Chalupa_Batman]

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@Dunkman wrote:

@Chalupa_Batman 

As with any data add on, your regular plan's data will be used first, then your data add on will be used.

So, in your situation, you will need to use up your plan's 50 GB first before the 240 GB bonus add on will kick in. 

That is why several legacy customers are complaining that they won't be able to use the bonus data add on because they rarely consume their regular data.  Especially for customers like yourself who are on higher data plans.  

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Thank you @Dunkman for the clarification. 

[Chalupa_Batman]

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@eyes wrote:

After 2,774 REPLIES just may be they will take notice. But who knows ? 

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You have to realize that most of the 2774 posts are side chatter and have nothing to do with this thread. I'm guessing that there are less than 500 legit complaints in this thread. I hate to say it but this thread got way out of control. This should have been moderated from the beginning. Legit complaints stay, side chatter is moved to a different thread and be continued there for legitimacy of our concerns/complaints.

[Dunkman]

@Chalupa_Batman 

As with any data add on, your regular plan's data will be used first, then your data add on will be used.

So, in your situation, you will need to use up your plan's 50 GB first before the 240 GB bonus add on will kick in. 

That is why several legacy customers are complaining that they won't be able to use the bonus data add on because they rarely consume their regular data.  Especially for customers like yourself who are on higher data plans.  

[HALIMACS]

@Chalupa_Batman 

this was one of the largest drawbacks of the bonus data, that one’s own plan data gets used first before we even start dipping into that AND most people have more data than they generally use in a cycle.

Adding to that, they’ve only given 150 days to use it so they know full well many users will have much of it expire and not be used.

Such a well thought out idea.  Definitely customer focused … 🙄 

[Legacy_Rewards]

@Chalupa_Batman 

That is the way it is suppose to work. Use your plan data first.