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Decoding Decoded RemarksBack to Top

These are the Decoded Remarks that Rogers entered into their Statement of Defence on October 4, 2006, in suppor of their claim that I "took it upon [myself] to obtain another cell phone for [my] son" and therefore am solely responsible for any losses that ensued.

Decoded Remarks

Shutting off a Child's Phone for Failure to Promise to Pay Upcoming Invoice Back to Top

 

Perhaps unlike other Rogers consumers in similar circumstances, I know for certain that Rogers took the decision to shut my son’s cell phone off on September 2, 2005, because I wasn’t making a “promise to pay” on a bill that wasn’t due (ever) because when I sued Rogers, I also asked, as per my contractual right, that Rogers release to me all files relating to my account.

 

Rogers provided me with a document called “decoded remarks”. This document provides a sketchy record of all computer notes written into my file.

 

If you open the decoded remarks and go to the entry for 9/2/2005 at 16:54, you will see that Accounts Receivable noted an “Unprecedented high balance” and then went on to note “Customer not making promise to pay”. (Keep in mind my invoice was due on September 10 and my account was, on September 2, in good standing, as it had always been.) Then Accounts Receivable goes on to note that they blocked my son’s cell phone “to avoid escalation”.

 

The only “escalation” of charges on my account occurred when MY cell phone was stolen and very liberally used between July 26 and August 16, 2005. My SON’S cell phone had NOT been stolen and never shown any but the most mundane pattern of use (and so there was no need to shut it off to avoid any hypothetical escalation). In fact MY cell phone had otherwise never shown any but the most mundane pattern of use.

 

Rogers was so otherwise confident that the prospect of extraordinary or “escalated” charges on my account was slight – in fact only occurring when my cell phone was stolen – that it happily restored service to my old cell phone number on 9/4/2005 at 15:12 on a new cell phone.

There are other unusual features in the Decoded Remarks that appear to speak to puzzling aspects of Rogers' operations.

Prophylactic EscalationBack to Top

The decoded remarks, representing the computer entries into my file, provide a fascinating record of how Rogers operates.

 

First of all, the decoded remarks make it clear that on August 26, 2006, Rogers escalated my account to the legal department and sent my account to Accounts Receivable for “collection treatment.”


This is absolutely astonishing to me for several reasons:

 

My account was not due until September 10. My previous invoice had been paid in full and on time. My account was in impeccable standing. What corporation sends an account to collection before it is even due? What corporation assumes that there is a legal dispute when the invoice is not even due.

On August 26, not only was my account in good standing, Rogers had not even made contact with me. The first time Rogers Wireless and I had a conversation about the astronomical charges on my account was on August 27.

 

For all Rogers knew on August 26, Susan G. Drummond was either Pakistani or had a good friend or family member in Pakistan. For all Rogers knew on August 26, I had made over $14,000 worth of phone calls on my cell phone. My account has no limit on long distance charges.

 

What on earth was Rogers doing escalating this account to their legal department before my invoice was due and before they had exchanged a word with me?

 

What on earth prompted Rogers to send my account for “collection treatment” before my invoice was due and before they had exchanged a word with me?

And there is yet another very strange anomaly that is hard to make sense of on the Decoded Remarks (though perhaps only those with the fortitude to keep track of a dizzying array of dates will keep up):

How Infallible Are Rogers' Decoded Remarks?Back to Top

For the entry at 9/12/2005 at 15:31, someone at Rogers wrote a note into the file indicating that my son's phone services were restored on September 12, 2005.

But almost immediately into my debacle with Rogers Wireless in late August, 2005, I had acquired the habit of documenting ever exchange with Rogers Wireless and also of recording every phone call.

When Rogers, despite my many requests, failed to restore wireless services to my son's cell phone, I purchased another cell phone from one of Rogers' competitors on September 14, 2005 and that very day I went to Rogers corporate head offices and handed Rogers' law clerk a letter saying that I had purchased a phone with another wireless provider because Rogers' had unilaterally suspended much needed services to my son's cell phone.

On September 19, 2005, I filed my Small Claims Court claim and that day, also served Rogers with a copy of my claim.

On September 21, 2006, as I had just received another whopping invoice (my invoices get sent out on the 14th of every month) I called a Rogers' CSR called "Jason", started the recorder running, told him that I was recording the phone call, and then proceeded to tell him that I was again disputing the extraordinary charges on MY cell phone, and that this month, I was also disputing the charge that claimed that I owed Rogers for both a "family plan" and for my son's cell phone. I explained to Jason that I was disputing those latter two charges because Rogers' had fundamentally breached its contract and suspended services to my son's phone, making the "family plan' useless.

Jason looked on the computer screen and, reading off of what was directly in front of him, said, three separate times, and into my running digital recorder, that Rogers had restored services to my son's cell phone on September 16 (two days AFTER I had mitigated my losses by going with a competitor). He agreed that Rogers had been wrong to shut it off in the first place.

September 21, 2005 conversation with Customer Service Rep, Jason.

And yet, despite Jason's thrice repeated report on what was on the computer screen in front of his eyes, it is written into the "Decoded Remarks" (which are effectively what the Jason would have been reading off of) that Rogers restored services 2 days BEFORE I purchased a phone from a competitor, on September 12.

Rogers had been served my Small Claims Court claim on September 19, 2005, which had been placed directly in the hands of the Rogers' legal clerk working on my file.

In Rogers' Original Pleadings of October 4, 2005, there is a paragraph that has been removed from the Amended Pleadings. It makes the legal argument, against my claim for damages for fundamental breach, that I didn't need to mitigate my losses because phone services had been restored to my son's phone two days BEFORE I purchased a new one. The paragraph is as follows:

paragraph 5. "On 31st of August, 2005, a message was sent to the Plaintiff's son's phone asking that the subscriber contact the Defendance immediatley. No response was received from this message and therefore this phone was suspended on Spetember 2, 2005 for ten (10) days. The Plaintiff took it upon herself to obtain another cell phone for her son."

Given that I was told by a CSR on September 21 (who was reading off of my file on a Rogers' computer screen and speaking into my digital recorder) that Rogers had restored services to my son's cell phone on September 16, clearly I was no longer just "taking it upon myself" on September 14 to obtain another cell phone but was doing so because, as per my claim, Rogers had forced me into that position.

As a result of all of this, I am left with considerable concern about the reliability of the "Decoded Remarks" and, in fact, the integrity of Rogers' contribution to the court record.

The impression is strong with me that Rogers has attempted to cover up it's legal transgression by altering the "Decoded Remarks".

In fact, so strong is this impression that Rogers has tried to cover up its legal problem by altering their evidence that I entered this concern into my claim for punitive damages.

Of course Rogers Wireless would not have known on October 4, 2005 when they filed their Statement of Defence with the above argument that I had recorded a telephone conversation with a CSR on September 21 telling me something that flat out contradicts what it is the "Decoded Remarks" that Rogers Wireless submitted to the court record. I don't know if Rogers was aware that from virtually my first exchange with the corporation, I was recording everything. The first evidence that Rogers received that I had recorded my September 21, 2005 conversation with a Rogers CSR was when I filed my Statement of Response on October 11, 2006 and entered "Jason's" remarks (in CD format) into the court record. On this CD was also Harry Gefen's recording of the Manager of Rogers' Fraud Department talking about Rogers' protocols and spectacular breaches of security at Rogers Wireless.

The concern about whether Rogers was attempting to cover up its legal transgression was significant enough that I raised it in my Amended Pleadings of March 3, 2006 as part of the legal argument for punitive damages.

Perhaps these anomalies can be made sense of. I've summonsed the VP General Counsel of Rogers to testify in my Small Claims Court case to set the record straight.

Donald Plumley, QC of Rogers Legal Team asked for an adjournment of the September 11, 2006 trial so he could move to quash that summons.

Cover Up?Back to Top

Amended Pleadings, March 3, 2006

Indication that Rogers appears to have manipulated and/or reconstituted

the documentary record in their “Decoded Remarks”

19. On September 21, I had a phone conversation with a Customer Service Representative (CSR) at Rogers called “Jason”. I recorded that conversation and have attached a digital audio recording of it to this response. (Exhibit D)

20. In that phone conversation, beyond acknowledging several times that Rogers had made a mistake when it put a block on my son’s cell phone, Jason read off of the computer record on my account which he had before him on the screen. Jason indicated clearly, three separate times, that the block on my son’s cell phone was lifted on September 16. So in fact, the block on my son’s cell phone was removed a full two days after Rogers’ Legal Department had received written notice from me that I had mitigated my losses from their fundamental breach of contract by purchasing a cell phone for my son from Bell Mobility. (Exhibit E)

21. Rogers’ “Decoded Remarks” in their Statement of Defense contain a note indicating that the block on my son’s cell phone was lifted on September 12 and the Statement of Defense repeats this inaccurate claim.

22. It appears that someone at Rogers manipulated the “Decoded Remarks” to make it appear as though the block was removed on September 12, rather than September 16.

23. This apparent manipulation of documentation entered into the court record appears to be in service of Rogers’ defence at paragraph 5 that I took it upon myself to obtain another cell phone for my son and that “The Defendant denies any and all responsibility for this purchase”.

24. If, as Rogers CSR Jason noted in a recorded telephone call, cell phone services were restored two days AFTER I hand-delivered notice to Rogers that I had mitigated my losses by entering a wireless service agreement with one of Rogers’ competitors, then paragraph 5 should fail: Rogers is wholly responsible for that purchase in virtue of Rogers fundamental breach of contract; a responsibility unmitigated by Rogers until two days AFTER I had notified Rogers of the remaining utter futility of their contract in light of Rogers’ own fundamental breach.

Further Indication that Rogers appears to have manipulated the documentary record

25. In the phone conversation of August 27, I indicated that my phone had been missing in May of 2005. An hour and a half after this August 27 conversation, my partner, Harry Gefen, called Rogers to ask what had been recorded to the file and to state, in no uncertain terms, that Rogers’ computer remarks were inaccurate given that the loss of my cell phone in May was unrelated to the theft of my cell phone in July. My cell phone, misplaced in May, had subsequently been found and used by me in June and right up until July 22. I have persistently acknowledged responsibility for all phone calls on my cell phone until July 22, 2005 making its misplacement in May irrelevant.

26. On August 27, Mr. Gefen explicitly asked for a correction to the record of any indication that the misplacement of my phone in May was related to the theft of my phone in July.

27. The September 3 note to the “Decoded Remarks” says “She herself said she thought phone was lost in May and never reported it.” It is inconceivable to me that I made that statement on September 3.

Evidence that Rogers’ Apparent Manipulation of the Court Record

may not be Atypical Conduct

28. The “Decoded Remarks” (established upon the “Literal Remarks” that are entered into the computer file of Rogers consumers) that Rogers submits to court records have an aura of authority and veracity to them that would be hard for the ordinary consumer to match. If indeed this manipulation of the court record took place, this provides evidence of a “cover up”, one of the issues canvassed in Whiten v. Pilot Insurance Company (2000) 209 D.L.R. (4th) 257(hereinafter Whiten) on when punitive damages are warranted.

29. Whiten also indicates that “Deterrence is an important justification for punitive damages. It would play an even greater role … if there had been evidence that what happened on this file were typical of the defendant’s conduct towards policyholders.”

30. Rogers consumer Erin Hipwell has published a testimonial that indicates that she has had the experience of the records on Rogers’ files conveniently no longer being present, or being suddenly introduced, on Rogers’ computer records. And this pattern of present or absent “records” entered by Rogers into their own “Literal Remarks” happened to coincide neatly in Erin’s case as well with Rogers’ interests and against her own. (See page iii of Exhibit L).

31. Erin’ Hipwell’s experience appears to reflect the emergence of a pattern of the Defendant’s “cover up” in the interests of furthering Rogers’ business interests. What happened to the “Decoded Remarks” in my file may indeed not be atypical of Rogers’ conduct.

32. Both a “cover up” and a pattern of such conduct are relevant for punitive damages.