Rogers says its wireless and internet services “are starting to recover” after a day-long outage across wide swathes of Canada.
A Rogers spokesperson told CP24 that engineers and technicians were “working hard to get everyone back online as quickly as possible.”
“As our services and traffic volumes return to normal, we will continue to keep our customers updated.”
Rogers CEO Tony Staffieri said the company could not say exactly when that moment would come.
“We don’t yet have an ETA on when our networks will be fully restored but we will continue to share information with our customers as we restore full service.”
The firm did not say what caused their service to go down on Friday but Staffieri said they would investigate “the root cause of this outage.”
Also on Friday evening, a senior spokesperson for Rogers told CTV News Toronto they would be “proactively crediting all customers” for their trouble with details to be announced later.
When is Rogers going to be fixed?
Federal Innovation Minister Francois Phillippe Champagne told CP24 on Friday night he had word that “that suggests that some service may have been re-established.”
But he said the network was not fully operational yet and the length of the outage was not acceptable.
“This is obviously unacceptable we will be investigating that to make sure it does not happen again.”
He said the Canadian Radio-television and Communications Commission would meet with Rogers leadership on Saturday.
Elsewhere in the federal government, intelligence analysts told Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino that they believed the outage was not caused by an external cyberattack.
There have been widespread implications of the outage in Ontario, including for people trying to call 911.
Multiple police departments said Friday morning that people may have trouble accessing emergency services over the phone.
Metrolinx warned customers that GO Transit tickets can’t be purchased using debit or credit payments.
Toronto concert venues urged patrons to print out physical copies of tickets because many virtual ticket reading applications are out of service due to the outage.
Scarborough Health Network in Toronto is asking all physicians and staff who are currently on call to come in for their shift until the disruption is solved. Many users have taken to social media to source information on the situation.
Toronto pop superstar The Weeknd announced that his tour stop at Rogers Centre has been postponed to a later date “due to service outages impacting venue operations.”
“Information on a new show date will be shared as soon as possible,” a statement read. “All tickets will be honoured for the new date. We understand how disappointing this is and apologize for the inconvenience.”
In April 2021, Rogers experienced a country-wide outage that saw many unable to place calls, send text messages, or access their internet browers. The communications company attributed this outage to a software issue.
In a tweet Friday morning, Bell said their customers may be experiencing issues while trying to call or text Rogers customers.
“The Bell network is operational and calls and texts between Bell customers or to other providers are not impacted,” the company said. CP24 is a division of Bell Media.
Telus issued a similar statement, tweeting “The network outage affecting Rogers customers is not impacting TELUS Internet, home phone or wireless infrastructure.”
Interac said in a statement that the outage has also affected its online services.
“There is currently a nationwide communications outage with a network provider which is impacting the availability of INTERAC services,” Interac said on Friday.
Telus issued a similar statement, tweeting “The network outage affecting Rogers customers is not impacting TELUS Internet, home phone or wireless infrastructure.”
Many retailers and businesses are also facing trouble trying to accept payments because Interac, which processes electronic financial transactions, said its online and checkout debit offerings and e-transfer services are impacted.
“There is currently a nationwide communications outage with a network provider which is impacting the availability of INTERAC services,” Interac said on Friday.
Downdetector, a website that tracks outages, showed people started reporting problems with Rogers’ service around 4:30 a.m. EDT and by 7 a.m. 20,000 reports had been logged.
Customers in Toronto, Kitchener, Moncton, Ottawa and Mississauga logged the most reports on the website with 45 per cent saying they were experiencing a total blackout, 29 per cent seeing issues with mobile internet and 26 per cent facing landline internet problems.
Downdetector also showed spikes in outage reports for independent service providers like TekSavvy, who often piggyback onto Rogers’ network.
TekSavvy said in a tweet that it was being impacted by the outage and having trouble with contact centre phone lines, but had no estimate for when there could be a resolution.
“The outage is illuminating the general lack of competition in telecommunications in Canada,” said Vass Bednar, executive director of McMaster University’s master of public policy program.
The country’s telecom sector is dominated by three large carriers — Rogers, BCE Inc. and Telus Corp. — and their hold on the industry has long been a concern of academics, who have called for regulators to increase competition for mobile and internet services in Canada.
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
