Calgarians who get their cell phone service through Bell Mobility should check their bills.
Some customers are finding the calls they made from Calgary were treated as if they were made from Edmonton.
One of those customers is Howard Darby. He was alerted to the problem through his company's bulletin board and that's when he checked his bill. Darby noticed he was being charged for long-distance calls from Edmonton. "I hadn't been to Edmonton in months," says Darby.
Darby called Bell Mobility customer service, explained the problem and the long-distance charges were reversed.
CTV's Lea Williams-Doherty contacted both the western regional customer service department and the technical solutions department but neither had heard of the problem in Calgary.
Persistence by Williams-Doherty paid off. She managed to speak to Julie Smithers, the public relations representative in Toronto and finally got an explanation.
"There was an issue with a new cell tower in Calgary that was incorrectly coded as being within Edmonton. As a result, a small number of customers - who were placing calls around that specific cell site - were charged for the calls as though they were being placed in Edmonton," says Smithers.
For October and November the tower, which is located at 7 Street and 7 Avenue, S.W., was incorrectly coded. Anyone who was closest to that tower when they were making, or taking, a call may have some of the incorrect charges on their bill.
Bell Mobility says the problem has been fixed so they won't be contacting customers about the problem. "At this point, it's a limited issue that has been corrected. We do encourage our customers to review their bills during that time period and contact us if they do see any incorrect charges," says Smithers.
