Telus, one of Canada’s leading telecommunication companies, posted a drop of 30% in the third quarter from a year earlier, which the company said was due to increased spending on new projects and a less favourable tax adjustment than in the previous year. The firm reported net income in the quarter of $285 million, or 89 cents a share, on sales of $2.45 billion in third quarter ended September 30. A year ago, statistics reveals, the company’s third-quarter profit of $409.9 million, or $1.24 a share, on sales of $2.31 billion a year. The company said an unfavourable after-tax adjustment in 2008 — after a favourable one a year ago — accounts for much of the adjustment in profit from year to year. Without the tax-related adjustments, it said net income and earnings per share would have decreased by 5.3% and 4.2%, respectively.
Telus adds 176,900 new wireless customers to put the company over six million wireless customers. The average revenue per subscriber per month, or ARPU, of Telus’s wireless service slipped 1% to $64.14 compared to the same quarter a year ago. According to Telus, ARPU from data services such as web surfing and texting was up, the revenue from voice services was down because of lower prices and the company’s new basic Koodo Mobile brand.