It looks like Bell
will be formally announcing the roll out of the Deferral Account project within
the next few weeks. It will be done as a combined release covering all the Deferral Account areas.
At a speech before the
Canadian Club of Montreal on 26 May 2014, Bell CEO George Cope stated, "We've
already begun to roll out, but we're actually going to announce over the coming
month or so all the different markets...right across the country."
Exactly what the announcement will include was
unclear except for the reference to the different markets. I hope that details
of the service will be made clear as well.
One disconcerting note was the reference to
having the project completed by the end of 2015 instead of the deadline of 31
Aug 2014 imposed by the CRTC. A couple of the quarterly reports submitted by
Bell to the CRTC did identify a few Deferral Account areas where they were
having problems acquiring tower sites and installing backhaul fibre optic cable.
Bell did not identify any of the Algoma District Deferral Account areas as problematic.
Bell did not provide a specific date when they
would make the follow-up announcement.
