Understanding your TELUS Business bill & charges

The first bill can be upsetting when you don't know what to expect or are unfamiliar with the charges it may show. While it will almost always be higher than all subsequent bills, a few specific charges ought to be taken into account. 

Partial Charges

• As our invoices always include charges for a month in advance as well as those for the days leading up to the first billing date, partial charges are likely to be applied. For example, if you have added an Office Phone, a Smartphone, or a Business Internet plan in the middle of a billing cycle, a partial charge from the date of your activation to your billing date*, as well as a charge for the next full month of service, will be added.

Activation fees

• Activation fees may also contribute to a higher bill. Those charges are unique to your first bill and are charged PER LINE activated and not as a single charge for the whole account. For example, if you have activated 4 lines on 1 account, you will see 4 activation fees.

Device Taxes

• Device taxes may be applied following an activation if you have ordered over the phone through us. Those are taxes charged PER LINE activated for mobility services relative to the value of the device you are financing.  

Upfront Cost 

• Also related to the device, the device upfront cost may appear on your first bill, depending on device financing tier you have chosen for mobility services.

Other charges

• Other charges may also appear if the limits of the plan were not respected. We will look at those in the sections below.

*Note: The billing cycle begins on the day following your billing date. For example, if your bill is printed on the 1st of the month, your cycle begins on the 2nd.

This is likely due to partial charges following a renewal or a rate plan change mid-billing cycle.*

• Partial charges

  • For example, if you renewed an office phone or mobility smartphone in the middle of a billing period, you will see a partial charge from the date of your activation to your billing date, as well as a charge for the next full month of service. This is also true when changing your plan outside of your billing date.

It is also possible that you may have incurred overage charges, third-party charges or even one-time charges.

These charges are explained in further detail in the sections below.

*Note: The beginning of the billing cycle is the day following your billing date. So, for example,  if your bill prints on the 1st of the month, your beginning cycle date is the 2nd.

You may see some charges that appear on your billing statement if the limits of your plan are not respected. These are mostly but not limited to calling and data or Internet usage.

These are the most common costs that may contribute to a higher bill:

• Data/Internet Overages

• Long-distance charges

• International calling charges

• Roaming charges

• Going over your local calling minutes

• Call forwarding

 Thankfully, those are easily avoidable beforehand by double checking what is included in your plan. To do so, log in to your My TELUS app or online portal.

You will find the definition of third party charges in the lexicon below.

However, here are some examples.

• Yellow pages advertising

• Android Play Store

• Apple App Store

• In-game purchases

• 1-900- numbers

• Directory assistance (411)

• Collect calls

• Google Pay

• Apple pay

• Skype

• Telehop

• Triton abbreviated dialing services

• Voxtel premium dialing services

• Boku

• And more

If you see this type of charge, you will be able to know which third party vendor is causing the charge. Please note that TELUS cannot refund those as they are not charged by us. Any dispute must be directed to the original third-party vendor.

Changes made to your account may bring about what we refer to as one-time charges.

Unlike the monthly plan, those charges will only show once every time you make a change.

These are examples of one-time charges

• Phone number change

• Connection

• Renewal

• Early Device Upgrade 

• Cancellation 

• Installation on site

• On-site maintenance

• On-site repairs

• Rate plan change

• Transfer of ownership

Thankfully, most of those charges can be avoided by logging in to your My TELUS profile and making these transactions yourself instead of waiting on the phone, and having an agent process it and charge the cost.

This type of multi-line discount is only available through TELUS Business Mobility. It applies only to certain plans such as Peace Of Mind for Business or Simple Share for Business. The current discounts are:

• 2 active lines, 10$/line discount*

• 3 active lines, 15$/line discount*

• 4 active lines and up, 20$/line discount*

When applied on your bill, you will see it applied before tax and only to the plan cost segment of the monthly cost. 

For example: If you have two lines, one has a Simple Share plan and one has a Peace of Mind plan, you get the 10$/line multiline discount. It will be applied like this:

• Line A = $75 minus $10 + tax*

• Line B = $80 minus $10 + tax*

As you can see, the lines don't need the same plan to have a discount, thus allowing you more flexibility to tailor the plans to your business needs.

*As stated, certain conditions may apply and those discounts are subject to change when adding, cancelling or renewing contracts or changing plans.

How TELUS calculates long distance charges is relative to many factors:

• Where you are located and where you are calling.

• The price plan you have is the second factor, as it states what restrictions and cost are applied.

• The third factor is the length of the call, as long-distance costs are calculated per minute.

Though long-distance can be confused with roaming, it is not the same thing. 

You can incur roaming plus long-distance charges if calling to another country while also being outside of Canada.

It is important to know that if you are not in your local calling area and your plan is not equipped for it, calls that you answer can also be charged long-distance fees. Fortunately, those are easily avoided by making sure you have the plan and features best tailored to your needs by logging into your My TELUS profile and adding the features of your choice.

Two things determine if a forwarded call is local or long distance:

• Your local calling area, which is the area or geographical boundary associated with your wireless number

• The number to which calls are being forwarded

If the number your calls are being forwarded to is local to the calling area of your phone number, your forwarded calls will be local. 

If the number your calls are being forwarded to is outside your local calling area, your forwarded calls will be considered long-distance.

Overages are calculated by seeing which limit has been exceeded. The plan and overage type dictates the cost. Here are how the different factors come into the equation.

• Plan

  This is what dictates both the limits and the cost per local minute, megabyte or long distance costs as well. These are directly tied to the plan.

• Calling overage

  This is what happens when the bucket of calling minutes is exceeded per billing cycle. The overage is calculated PER minute exceeded and is rounded up to the nearest minute. For example: 1minute 45 seconds is calculated as 2 minutes. This is then multiplied by the cost per minute according to your plan stipulations.

• Data Overage

  Depending on your business plan, you have a monthly data allowance per billing cycle. If you exceed this limit then the cost is calculated PER MB of overage. For context, your plan will come with GB(Gigs) of data allowance. Each GB(Gig) is comprised of 1000MB(Megabites). So if you have a 10GB plan we calculate your usage on 10,000MB and if you have used 10.5gb we will then charge 0.5GB, so 500MB of overage, times the cost PER MB according to your plan stipulations.

Fortunately these are easily avoided by making sure you have the best plan and features for your needs by logging into your My TELUS profile and adding features tailored to your business needs.

This is what we call a rate plan or option charge that does not cover a full month in most cases. In a nutshell, we divide your plan and options costs by 30 (number of days in a billing cycle) and multiply the amount by the number of days left before your billing date. The calculation method and an example calculate can be found above.

A one-time fee that is charged PER LINE activated. It is only charged when a new number is activated to your account and the term is mostly used for your Business mobility accounts.

Like the activation fee, a one-time charge. You will see this fee when you upgrade a line on your account. It is charged PER LINE renewed.

Because TELUS now finances devices, we require the taxes on the financed amount paid upfront.

TELUS offers many ways to finance your device. The upfront cost is the price you have paid for your device APART from the taxes up front.

A Billing Cycle refers to the 30 days between the billing date and the billing end date. For example, if your bill prints on the 3rd of a given month, your billing cycle will begin on the 4th and end on the 3rd of each month.

This is the end day of your cycle/the day on which your bill prints.

This section in your bill refers to the plan charges incurred during both your upcoming billing cycle also past cycle in the case of overages or expenses not covered by the plan.

Refers to the 3% charge that is added to your bill for past due charges. We do not add the late fee to the current charges.

If you have any unpaid balances carrying over from your past bill, they will show in this section of the bill.

Not all plans cover long-distance calls. If this is the case with yours, you will be billed long distance charges, which will count as overages. It is always best to check your coverage before making long-distance calls. You can do so and add long distance minutes to your plan by logging into your My TELUS Self-Serve Portal or via the Virtual Assistant located at the bottom left of this page. See how we calculate long distance costs above.

This is the monthly amount you will be paying. It is the cost of the device split over 24 or 36 months according to the choice you made upon signing your contract. It is not taxed, as taxes are paid upfront.

A type of charge that occurs only if you make changes to your plan, contract or services. We have listed some examples of these above.

These are charges incurred either when out of the country or sometimes when bordering another country, as you would if you were in Canada a few steps away from the US (should this occur in your case, please ensure to contact us so we can solve the issue). These charges can be charged per day or per minute depending on the type of plan you have. It is important to always verify your coverage before leaving the country. You can do so and add roaming minutes or packages as needed by logging into your My TELUS self serve portal.

This type of discount is associated with business mobility accounts. A discount is offered when you have 2 or more mobility lines linked to eligible plans. Not all plans are entitled to this type of discount.  See above for more details.

TELUS sometimes has promotions only available upon activating or renewing a line. They are often offered over the length of the contract as a monthly deduction from the plan. Sometimes, they may show as a larger amount off of the price of the device, leaving you less of the device amount to finance over the length covered by the chosen contract.

Like activation credits, we may offer credits for bringing your mobility business phone number (port-in) over from a competitor. These types of credits are often applied from the second bill and over the following 4 months for a total of 5 months of credits, depending on the port-in promotion that was available when you activated the line. These only apply to the line being activated and not to every single existing line linked to the account.

You may also have benefited from a promotional discount when you activated or renewed your service, or even because you have more than one TELUS Business product. These will appear on your bill monthly. Depending on the conditions when you signed up and the product, they might apply to either the plan or the device.

If you do not wish to reprint your own bills and wish for us to do so for you, there will be a cost PER bill. If you wish to save that cost, we do have a Step-by-Step Guide on how to reprint your bill for free here.

If an agent changes a phone number for you, you will be charged a $15 fee per phone number changed. When contacting Customer Service to change your phone number, you will be encouraged to change it yourself via your My TELUS online portal. This is because using the self-serve portal to change your phone number is free. Click here for the steps to follow in the process.

With TELUS Business Mobility, it is possible to upgrade your device at any time during your contract. Because of how devices are financed, it is easy to decide when you want to pay off that financing balance and choose a new device to finance. If you decide to do this at any time before the contract expires, the device balance will appear on the bill following that change.

A cancellation will be shown on your bill if you are cancelling a product before the term of the contract you signed up for is finished. These fees are relative to the product you are cancelling and to the length of time left in your term, and they are independent from the device balance.

Some TELUS Business services require a technician to come onsite for installation purposes. You will see these for services such as TELUS Business Security, Office Phone or Office Internet services.

You will see these for services such as TELUS Business Security, Office Phone or Office Internet services when moving locations.

You will see these for services such as TELUS Business Security, Office Phone or Office Internet services when a damage or a user error has caused a technician to have to be dispatched to repair the issue.

If a customer service agent changes your rate plan, you will encounter these fees on the bill following the change. You can easily use your self-serve to change your rate plan, as seen here, to avoid these charges when changing your plan.

You will only see this type of charge if you ever have either added a line to your TELUS Business account that already existed on another TELUS account or if you have migrated your lines from one Business account to another because your company has changed incorporation number, name or tax numbers. These charges are PER LINE  migrated and not per account.

This refers to purchased content including but not limited to, advertising services,  in-game purchases, applications, games, music and books from third party vendors or providers that you can charge to your TELUS Business bill. Examples of what storefronts could cause these charges can be found above.

As the name states, these are not recurring charges. They will appear only if there is a modification brought to the services, account or subscribers. Examples of this type of charge can be found above.

This is what we refer to when the set limits for a plan or service are not respected. Depending on your business plan, you have a monthly usage allowance (data or otherwise). If you go over your limit within your billing cycle, you will see a charge called an overage on your bill. Above you will find some of the types of overages that exist and how they are calculated.

This is what we call it when incoming calls are routed from one phone number to another number. View how those costs are calculated above.