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An Ontario judge has ruled that Bell Canada Inc. has improperly collected millions each year from satellite television customers who are late paying their monthly bills.

In a decision handed down late yesterday, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice sided with a class action suit that claimed a $25 “administrative” fee charged to Bell ExpressVu customers who were more than two months late paying their bills amounted to a criminal rate of interest.

The law in question prohibits annual interest rates in excess of 60 per cent and was originally intended to target loan sharks.

“This goes beyond Bell,” said Paul DeWolf, the suit’s representative plaintiff, in an interview today.

“If this ruling holds, a lot of companies are going to have to reassess their positions.”

DeWolf lives in Braeside, Ont., near Ottawa, and works for Metroland Media Group, a company owned by the Toronto Star’s parent, Torstar Corp.

The class action was launched on behalf of some 33,000 current and former ExpressVu customers that pay the late charge each month. The satellite TV service has about 1.7 million subscribers in total.

Bell, which is expected to appeal the ruling, had unsuccessfully argued that the administration fee reflected the costs it incurred when a customer’s account remained unpaid for two months.

The fee is on top of a monthly interest rate of 2 per cent charged by Bell on overdue amounts free credit report instantly.

The next stage of the class action will be to determine damages.

The original suit demanded ExpressVu cease the practice and repay the money collected since 2003 or, alternatively, pay $100 million in damages and another $10 million in punitive damages. However, most class action suits are settled for far less than the damages originally claimed.

DeWolf said he still expected damages to be in the “tens of millions.”

According to court documents, De Wolf failed to pay his bill by the due date on 47 occasions between January 2001 and May 2006, racking up $226 in “administration” fees.

That means De Wolf failed to pay his bill by the due date nearly 80 per cent of the time, a dismal track record he attributed to poor postal service to his small community and Bell’s billing cycle.

The ExpressVu ruling comes amid other class actions targetting the Canadian telecommunications industry, including one that focuses on the so-called “system access” fees charged by the country’s wireless carriers, including Bell. A Saskatchewan court certified the class action last year.

Another class action, which has yet to be certified, targets the emergency 911 fees charged to wireless subscribers.

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