The Canadian Competition Bureau today announced that it has ordered Rogers Communications Inc. to pay a penalty of CA$10 million for misleading advertising of Rogers’ chatr discount cell phone and text service. Specifically, Rogers ran advertising where it promised “fewer dropped calls than new wireless carriers” and that customers would have “no worries about dropped calls.”
“We take misleading advertising very seriously,” said Melanie Aitken, Commissioner of Competition. “Consumers deserve accurate information when making purchasing decisions and need to have confidence they are not being misled by false advertising campaigns.”
The Bureau concluded that there was “no discernible difference in dropped call rates between Rogers/Chatr and new entrants” after a review of technical data obtained from a number of different sources.
Rogers has also been ordered to stop this advertising campaign and pay restitution to affected customers.