How not to treat your customers

Consumer Talk

SOME consumers have an amazing capacity to endure abuse at the hands of a company they’ve chosen to do business with.

When they finally seek my help or advice, their e-mails describe a series of injustices which leave me wondering what took them so long to seek outside intervention.

Ian Bulford’s experience at the hands of Autopage Cellular is one of those cases.

He shared what he called his “tale of woe” with me last week, when his connection had been severed yet again.

His story began in early 2010 when he signed a contract with Autopage – the Talk 100 package.

In January this year he received a call from an Autopage telesales agent well that month.

But on April 1 Bulford noticed that his BlackBerry internet service had been deactivated. It was a mistake, Autopage confirmed, promising to fix it within 24 hours.

It did, but in the process his contract changed from Top Up 400 to a more expensive Talk 1000S.

“Further calls confirmed their error and they promised to rectify it,” Bulford said.

But things went from bad to worse when he got a statement in the post asking him to pay R2 851 for the package he hadn’t asked for or agreed to.

“To cut a long story short, promises were made to rectify the error but to no avail until, at the end of April, I decided to approach the Greenstone shopping centre branch of Autopage – in Edenvale – in person,” Bulford said.

There, he told the whole story to an assistant and she made a few calls and then did what all her colleagues had done up to that point – promised to sort it all out.

“She also instructed me to put a stop payment on my bank account so that the amount of R2 851 could not be taken, and told me to go into my bank and pay directly into their account the sum of R498, which was the correct amount for the Top Up 400 contract.”

Bulford did just that and handed the assistant a copy of his deposit slip.

On May 1 his contract reverted to Top Up 400 and he received a statement indicating that a credit had been passed for that R2 851. It also reflected his R500 payment. But his troubles weren’t over.

A few days later he got a call from Autopage saying his account was in arrears to the tune of R2 351 and threatening to disconnect Bulford’s service if the amount wasn’t paid.

“Despite trying to explain the circumstances to the caller, my phone was switched off immediately after that call ended,” he told Consumer Talk.

Back to the Greenstone branch he went, but this time the assistant was apparently not interested in his problem.

“My phone remained off for the entire weekend and was reconnected only on Monday,” he said.

Promises were made to credit his account for the error, and he received another SMS, with the promise of a further credit of R1 664.

“Then I received an e-mail from Autopage, reflecting my May statement and that R1 664 credit.

“Again I thought that was the end of the matter until I received an SMS on May 28 telling me my service was being suspended due to nonpayment.” And it was.

“I have asked for the contract to be cancelled as I no longer wish to be saddled with this kind of service, but e-mails to them have gone unanswered,” Bulford told Consumer Talk.

“Where do I go to from here?”

I took up the case with Autopage Cellular, saying he was willing to stick with the contract he agreed to in the upgrade in January, “provided Autopage is willing and able to get its house in order, sort out the financial mess and stop falsely accusing him of owing what he does not for a contract he did not agree to – and stop locking his number”.

And if that didn’t happen, he’d be within his rights to cancel his contract, without paying a penalty, given the lack of service he had received.

Customer relationship manager Zenobia Katts got back to me the next day – last Tuesday – to say Bulford had been contacted “and our retentions team will ensure that the upgrade is cancelled”.

“My team will follow up until resolution and confirm closure.”

This week, Bulford said he had received a call from an Autopage employee saying his service would be reinstated, and last Tuesday he was sent an e-mail stating his contract was being “migrated”.

“I am not sure what this means, as I was told this more than a month ago; my May statement reflected a credit balance, and yet my service was suspended because the system reflected that I was in arrears,” he said.

“Clearly there’s a communication breakdown somewhere.”

You’d think that after all the unjustified suspensions and hassle Bulford has endured, he’d have received an apology from Autopage and perhaps some “goodwill” airtime credit.

Nope. Clearly the company does not regard this as an exceptional case.