Residential Telephone Service Survey

The proportion of Canadian households relying only on cell phones for communications instead of landline phones has more than doubled in just over two years, according to new data from the Residential Telephone Service Survey.

As of December 2005, just over 615,000 households, or 4.8% of the total, reported having only a cell phone, compared with just 1.9% in mid-2003.

Households in the two westernmost provinces, British Columbia and Alberta, are leading the way in growth.

About 7.1% of British Columbia households had only a cell phone at the end of last year, more than triple the proportion from mid-2003. In Alberta, the proportion more than doubled to 5.8%.

Low-income households are more likely to have only a cell phone. The survey showed that 7.7% of households that were below Statistics Canada's low-income cutoff (LICO) had only a cell phone, nearly double the proportion of 4.1% of households above the LICO. (The LICO is a statistical measure of the income thresholds below which Canadians likely devote a larger share of income than average to the necessities of food, shelter and clothing.)

Households in large urban centres are most likely to have a cell phone only.

Nearly one out of every 10 households (9.6%) in Vancouver had only a cell phone, the highest proportion among the census metropolitan areas. Households in Montréal and Calgary were tied for a distant second at around 6.4%.

The survey also showed that just over 156,000 households, or 1.2% of the total, did not have any telephone service at all. This represents a significant decline from the previous year (1.5%), a figure that had been virtually unchanged since this survey first began monitoring telephone subscription rates in 1998.

Almost 3% of households in Prince Edward Island did not have any phone service, the highest rate among the provinces.

Households that did not have any phone service cited basic local monthly rates and installation charges that were too difficult to afford.

More than half of Canadian households had more than one phone line. Almost 3.7 million (28.6%) households reported having two phone lines, and 3.4 million (26.2%) reported having three or more phone lines.

Note: The Residential Telephone Service Survey, conducted since the fall of 1998, is now carried out for Aliant Telecom Inc., Bell Canada MTS Allstream Inc., Northwestel Inc., Saskatchewan Telecommunications and TELUS Communications Inc. It monitors residential phone penetration rates and reasons for non-subscribing to assist the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission in making decisions on rate increases and decreases, or subsidies.

Definitions, data sources and methods: survey number 4426.

The microdata file Residential Telephone Service Survey (56M0001XCB, $535) is now available. Information in this file is from the December 2005 survey and refers to telephone service penetration rates in all 10 provinces.

For more information on related products and services, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact Client Services (1-800-461-9050; 613-951-3321; fax: 613-951-4527; ssd@statcan.gc.ca), Special Surveys Division.