Are you looking for how to negotiate your Telus and Shaw Internet bill? You’ve come to the right place. I’ve used both Telus vs Shaw Internet service providers before, but currently I am with Telus and am paying a very reasonable amount for our Internet bill. How do you save money on Internet? Here’s how to negotiate Telus and Shaw Internet.
How to Negotiate Telus and SHaw Internet
Instead of thinking “how do I get a better deal with Shaw” you can take action by negotiating.
Essentially, you have to make a phone call at regular intervals to the Internet service providers (Telus or Shaw). This is one way that I try to save money fast (like to the tune of over $7000 a year).
I like Telus, perhaps I am a little biased since I am a Telus shareholder and it is one of my favourite Canadian dividend stocks.
I personally view Internet as a utility now, it’s a “NEED” for us. Something that we cannot do without, like electricity, or our cell phone bills. So saving money on something so essential for us is an added bonus.
Updated January 2023
Unfortunately I don’t live in a building with Novus Internet which is known to be cheaper and faster than other competitors for those that live in Vancouver, Richmond, Coquitlam, Burnaby, and Surrey. For example, the first year promo is $35 a month for Internet 35.
Therefore, I have to resort to (seemingly desperate) negotiation tactics to save money on Internet. I loathe having to pay $75 a month + tax for Internet even though it’s pretty much a necessity for me (e.g. a utility!).
Currently we are paying under $35 including tax for our Internet with Telus (this has varied over the years but it has always been under $45 including tax). The Internet normally costs $75 plus tax per month, that means we are saving $648 a year. We don’t have the fastest Internet available but it is enough for us. We don’t watch videos or movies too often.
Ready? Let’s get negotiating! But first, a GIF from Ozark (best Netflix show!)
Here’s the step-by-step guide on how to negotiate with Telus and Shaw for your Internet bill:
- Basically the gist of it is, that you call into your service provider and ask to cancel your Internet.
- Then you will speak to a retentions Internet customer service representative who will listen to your concerns and then you bring up the competitor pricing, it can help if you have the Telus loyalty phone number. If you have Telus Fibre you can call that number directly.
- They will tell you that you have been a loyal customer for over X amount of years and they don’t want to see you go.
- You agree and nod and say “yes, I don’t want to go because the Internet is great, but I don’t want to pay $75 a month for Internet, it’s just too much”.
- Then they will talk to their manager and “see what I can do” and you wait patiently listening to muzak for 5 minutes.
- Then they come back and tell you they can offer you “X per month Internet for the next 6 months and then it will go back up to X amount of dollars per month”.
- You say thank you and then smile to yourself at all the money you’re saving (you can smile on the inside too).
- Then you call back in 5.5 months (or whatever time frame it is) and repeat this again.
Here are some tricks and tips to negotiate Telus and Shaw Internet that I have learned over the years.
Being Without a Contract Is Mandatory For Strategic Negotiations
First of all, to be able to negotiate with Telus and Shaw for your Internet bill, you’ll need to NOT be in a contract. This is mandatory for strategic negotiations.
You know those 2 year Optik TV and Internet bundle contracts where you get a $500 prepaid Visa or something for signing up? Or a free TV for signing up?
Yeah, those don’t work well with negotiations because you don’t have any ammo. You’ll likely be stuck paying $70+ a month for your Internet because you wanted that $500 Prepaid Visa (or whatever that gift they enticed you with). You don’t have anything to threaten Telus or Shaw with (e.g. you can’t walk away).
It is important to read the fine print because the “contracts” may not be worded like a contract and instead say “2 year Plan” or something like that.
This is very similar to negotiating with your mobility service provider- the best ammo is not being on contract. Here’s how I upgraded from my iPhone 5 to an iPhone 8, got it for $0, and managed to only pay $5 extra a month for the next two years.
You should Google search for something like “shaw loyalty deals 2022” or “Telus vs Shaw Bundles 2022” before you start negotiating. Y
ou’ll be able to find forums like iPhone in Canada, Red Flag Deals, or even Reddit with the latest deals that other members have obtained.
Timing Is Important
Secondly, timing is very important. From my experience, I would say that the best time of year to negotiate your Internet bill is the back-to-school time (August or September).
There are a lot of promotions at this time and the Internet service providers are all trying to show their best 3 or 6 month deals and promotions.
However, sometimes you can’t help it and will have to take what’s available, especially if you’re having to call back every 3-6 months to negotiate your Internet.
One time I was just too tired of calling every 3 months (I think I was like 4 weeks post partum when I was calling in to negotiate and I was very sleep deprived) and I just took a few dollars more per month to not have to call back every 3 months and instead got to wait for one year before I had to call again.
Be Prepared With Data and Quotes
Do a quick search of the plans available with the competitors so you know what you’re dealing with when you call and speak to your customer service representative.
Yes, search and look up Telus vs Shaw Bundles 2022 or Shaw Internet promotion and look at what you get.
Collect that data, take screen shots, and be prepared to use these quotes with the customer service representative.
At the time of writing the ‘deals’ are not that great. In fact, with Shaw and it was hard to find non 2 year contracts, and I see that they are trying to coax new customers into signing a 2 year ValuePlan term (meaning if you try and cancel beforehand they will ding you with $15 for each month you have left in the contract).
I did find an Shaw Internet 15 (slower than the Internet I have right now) and it is for the same price as the Telus offer:
For Telus, I had to dig around a few pages to find the page that didn’t have any contracts. The no contract price for Internet 25 is $55/month for the first 3 months:
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Personally I would be prepared to leave Telus for Teksavvy Internet if they ever not honour my pricing or if I have to pay a lot more. One of my friends (who was a Shaw devotee) recently switched to Teksavvy and she’s happy with her Internet so far.
Here’s the pricing for Teksavvy. As you can see it is more economical than Shaw or Telus. Their 15 Mbps Internet is only $40 a month.
Be Organized and Set a Reminder
Another key step to negotiating with Telus and Shaw for Internet is being organized and setting a reminder. After you call in to negotiate and are happy with your monthly Internet fee, they will tell you how long their discount is available for.
After that you’ll be stuck paying regular price again (read, $75 a month + tax or more) for your Internet. Therefore it’s important to call in before this happens (I’d say a few weeks before it happens) to renegotiate with your Internet service provider.
Some people don’t want to do this and can’t be bothered to make a phone call (sometimes it can be a long wait to wait on hold to speak to a Telus or Shaw customer service provider) but to me, saving over $600 a year is worth a little inconvenience.
I usually set a reminder on my iPhone after I receive the new offer and write it in my calendar so I know when I need to call back.
Make sure you call back before your special pricing deal is over or else you get an unexpected surprise on your Internet bill.
Sometimes they offer a monthly Internet price a little higher than what you would normally pay but the duration lasts longer (e.g. one year) and even if it’s a $1 or so increase I’m okay with that because calling every 3-6 months is a bit of a hassle.
For example, we recently signed a two year “contract” with Telus that locks in the price so I don’t have to call every 3-6 months. To me, the convenience and locked in price beats having to call every 3 months, since we’re now dealign with runaway inflationary prices of everything.
Be Prepared to Walk Away
Finally, and probably the most important element of negotiations, is that you have to be prepared to walk away from your Internet service provider.
Yes, that may mean that you will need to get a new modem or router (or whatever they are called, as you can tell I am not very tech savvy) or rent one, or pay for one, and return the old one to your Internet service provider if you rented it. It’s a hassle, I know.
That will also mean that you will need to be prepared to jump ship and get a new service provider, potentially pay the installation fee, and wait for half of your work day for the Internet installer person to come and install your Internet.
Yes, it’s a huge hassle! So even though you’re not ‘under contract’ most people (including myself) just stick with their main provider for convenience.
I personally ALMOST had to walk away (because the customer service representative just knew I was crying wolf when I called in to ‘cancel’ my Internet). I even had the last date of Internet with my provider available to me.
I decided to call back and got to speak to someone else and they were able to give me the Internet price I wanted without having to change Internet providers.
It was a close call.
Review Your Internet Bill After the Fact
After you do your negotiation you’ll feel a big sigh of relief.
However it’s not over.
Remember to check your Internet bill for the breakdown and make sure what the customer service representative told you is what is reflected on your bill.
Unfortunately recently I had a bit of a discrepancy with just that.
What the customer service rep said was different from my actual bill. On top of that, I was charged a fee for a new contract which the customer service representative never informed me of. This is the first time I’ve been charged a fee for renewing an Internet service contract.
I called back and another customer service representative graciously waived this $15 fee for me.
Internet for Good Program
If you are a low income senior in BC or AB, you’re in luck and you won’t need to resort to negotiation.
Telus released a new program for Low Income Seniors who live in British Columbia or Alberta as of January 2022.
If you are a Low Income Senior receiving GIS (Guaranteed Income Supplement) or can provide your OAS (Old Age Security) statement, it’s also called the T4A(OAS), indicating an amount paid to you in box 21, you could qualify for Telus’ Internet for Good Program.
The Internet for Good Plan is Internet 25 for $9.95 plus taxes per month or Internet 50 for $19.95/month plus taxes.
This is great considering Internet can be so expensive and for many, is considered a necessity rather than a want.
There we go, hopefully this negotiation cheat sheet helps you pay less for your Internet bill!
If you’re interested in getting a $300 bank bonus or a new iPad courtesy of RBC for your lower priced internet, here are some new bank account bonuses in Canada to sign up for.
You may also be interested in:
How much do you pay for Internet a month in your parts?
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It’s crazy that this is necessary, but left alone we find our telecom bill will just keep going up. I’d like to start a business where I can just keep passing on price increases without notification or justification. I find insurance is similar. Tom
@Tom- You too eh? I thought it was just the Internet monopoly in Canada. I find home insurance to be difficult to negotiate or adjust- I should look into it. Automobile insurance in BC- we have a crown corporation (which is not well managed) and the prices are fixed for the basic insurance.
This is going to sound a bit rant-y but:
I had to do this a few times with Telus after my basic cable + internet went North of $100/month. Each time they would temporarily lower the price by $10 or so for a few months (once they threw in a specialty channel as well). After a while though, I got fed up thought about switching to Lightspeed internet (similar to TekSavvy, Lightspeed is a Shaw reseller but I have heard better reviews for them than TekSavvy). Interestingly, during the cancellation process when I mentioned the price (~$45 for Internet 75) to the Telus rep, they were all of a sudden able to offer me the same internet and cable I had for $40 for 2 years. The fact there was such a disparity broke the camels back and I decided to indeed switch.
I now use Lightspeed for internet and an old-school (well, newer style of old-school) set-top antenna for TV to get local news. I couldn’t be happier with the money I save.
@Mike- I love rants! $100 a month! But that’s with basic cable. Cable is always a b*tch to pay for. Man, that must have pissed you off royally. They seem to really respond better when you tell them what the competition has in store- $40 for two years is a great deal but they had lost your loyalty now– too late for them!
Way to be persistent! It does sound time consuming but that is $500 after tax dollars! If you calculated how many hours you would have to work to earn $500 after tax you are likely spending your time well!
@Laura- Good point, I always forget to think about things in after tax dollars.
I was doing these steps as well about 7-8 years ago with our internet provider. When MwC and I first moved in together, we latched on to 1 year promo with AT&T for $20/month. When that one year was up, I would call them up and did the same exact steps like you did and it worked for the better part of three years. I would negotiate every time the promo was expiring and got around the same monthly rate ($20-$25).
That last year, they wouldn’t cave in and was offering close to $60/month. And so we switched providers to our current one. It started at $40/month and just last year it increased to $50. Now I’m not willing to negotiate anymore because it’s one of the lowest providers out there and sitting on $50/month is fine by me.
If they get to $75, I would then go through my negotiating tactics again and may have to use your guide as reference!!
@Kris- Awe man $20 a month is great! Too bad AT&T wouldn’t allow you to keep that price. $50 a month is reasonable for Internet (I find it a necessity now rather than a utility). Our Netflix is increasing to $13.99 a month and there’s likely a threshold that we have until we stop the subscription.
This is a great article, and the tactics work… but it seems only for certain people! My brother and others we’ve known always have luck with Telus when speaking to the retention/loyalty departments.
However, I, my sister, and others get rejected no matter how many times we try!
After years of trying our best to keep the rates low, we finally switched to Lightspeed and have been very happy. No more negotiating—just the same low price every month.
Too bad we never had luck with Telus!
@Chrissy- Really! Great to hear that you also have good experience with Lightspeed, I’ll definitely look into that one as I have not heard of it before I wrote up this post! 🙂
Well, I am glad to know NB isn’t the only place where the pricing on Internet is bonkers.
Couldn’t tell you what we pay for our Internet right now (all our utilities are included in our rent, which is nice) but when we lived in our first apartment, it was insane. Started at $45/month – I didn’t know anything about contracts at that time, so I stupidly signed up for a promo – then it doubled. I was always fighting with them about it – they wanted us to bundle it but we didn’t want cable or a home phone. I was usually able to negotiate it down but it was always a headache.
One of the worst things that happened during that time was when the dude for the company came around our building looking to sign folks up for Fibre Op. We were interested (it actually would have cost us less than the high-speed. SO STUPID) but I told him I was surprised he was there, since the rep on the phone told me our building was not wired for Fibre Op. He was very insistent that was not the case, that they checked that, etc. Cool. We filled out the paperwork and he went on his way.
A couple days later we get a call from the ISP saying oops, sorry! Your building does not have Fibre Op! We shouldn’t have been trying to sell it there! I was LIVID, man. I still get mad thinking about it sometimes. That said, I did end up getting a fairly substantial discount for my troubles – and when they finally did wire our building, we got a discount then, too.
ANYWAY all that to say, far as I have found, Internet costing across Canada is ridiculous. These tips will be super helpful if/when we end up with an Internet bill again!
@Tara P- Awe so they wasted your time! At least you got compensated for it. That’s awesome that your internet is included in your rent. They really ‘get’ you after the promo ends. I think most people lose track of when the promo goes, life is busy! If I didn’t put a reminder I would definitely forget.
I am just leaving Rogers Internet (Toronto) because the price keeps going up. The usual hassles but in the end, quite polite. I have signed up with Pathway who I believe is all across the country. $50 for Fastpatht15. I used them years ago and they are right. I had to leave because I had Bell Fibe and had to use the Bell internet. I quit Bell for guess why?
@David Rathgeber- Thanks for sharing all the alternatives. I have not heard of Pathways either. I guess Bell didn’t want to play ball with you for negotiating? 😉
Hi GYM, thanks for detailing the process step by step. I did the same as you outlined with Bell (in Quebec). It was fine but I found the “game” tiresome. Since 2017, I signed on with Virgin Mobile and the monthly price has been stable. No more hassle of having to remember to call twice a year and no haggling. It’s pleasant to just pay the monthly voice with no surprises. I also have Virgin Home Phone which gives me a second phone line and is portable across Canada.
@Harry- You’re welcome! It is tiresome. Thanks for sharing Virgin Mobile- I didn’t know they had home internet. Do you use mobile internet for your home internet?
I follow these tactics with Rogers (Toronto area) with internet / cable / phone…next step (ironically tomorrow), I’m calling before the deals all ‘bounce off’ (it’s been 11 months). This time planning to drop our home phone (have North American LD & all features incl in mobile plan already (Telus))…hopefully our cable/internet won’t jump!!
I also find it so annoying that I need to mark my calendar and go to battle every time to get rates that are what we should be paying in the first place (still not cheap in my eyes). (don’t get me started on the customer service…we moved a year ago and it took 4 phone calls, hours & hours, and multiple technician visits for Rogers to properly hook up & bill us correctly).
@Sharon- Good luck tomorrow! That’s a big step to drop the home phone, we don’t have a home phone either. Maybe we might once our little one wants to talk on the phone or make plans with their friends. Haha, “Go to Battle” that’s exactly what it is! I swig a cup of coffee before I make ‘the call’ and take a deep breath.
It’s become obvious that we will be negotiating with these people for many years. It is therefore a good idea to develop a plan for periodically changing software and hardware. I would suggest having a checklist for phone/internet/tv to refer to when negotiating:
1. Is the monthly price fixed.
2. If there is a contract for 2/3 years does the contract state the price is fixed for the term or does it just obligate you to keep paying even when the price escalates?
3. Is there a price for terminating the contract early?
4..Can the service be changed? I.e. can you migrate from internet 15 to internet 25 with the same hardware and without penalty?
5. For telephone service, what is the long distance rate. My Primus telephone is 3 cents per minute. The Bell rate is 40 cents per minute! (I know, it’s hard to believe!)
5. Read the fine print. On the Bell website (Eastern Canada) the fine print states that anything can be changed at any time. In addition, the special price includes 4 or 5 promos, any of which can disappear at anytime
6. If you find a supplier that is reliable, cheap and honest, let everyone know.
@David- Thanks for this checklist, very comprehensive 🙂
Resellers sell the same product as Telus or Shaw for a fraction of the price. I’m on a reseller for fiber and I pay $55 a month for 950/950 service.
@Rob M- Thanks for sharing the scoop!
Just curious as to what the name of this ‘fiber’ reseller is and what province/city are you in?
Free Installation fees are based on the number of services you will have after installation. So, if you have no services with Shaw at all currently and install internet, it will be $29.95.
Sent Telus’ Optik tv equipment back to them, and now use over-the-air indoor antenna for all the live tv I want or need. Cost is currently zero.
Dropped their internet connection, and don’t want to have to renegotiate every six months.
Signed up with no contract with a VOIP company (good number of them around, such as TekSavvy or GetUs.com) and pay less than $40/month for basically the same internet service as Telus was providing.
@JusMe- Thanks for sharing your tip on how to save money on Internet.