14 days with unnecessary billing

Two to three months ago I disconnected my dstv for travelling reasons. I came back and reconnected my account on the 3rd of June 2015. I made another payment on the 1st of July. Near the end of July was unavailable. I was unable to contact mutichoice to suspend my account till further notice. I reactived my account to day and sent them prove of payment. I was told that they can't activate it cause of I didn't make payment and there was 14 days over view on it. I asked the agent how could they allow this. I asked the agent how days does a dstv stay on after failure of payment. She responded two to three days. I asked her then why was my dstv still on for 14 days after my payment was due. She gave me a response that my dstv was not suspended and my dstv was still active until the 14th of august. That's 11 days still active for the time my payment was due and for a time period I was unavailable in the country. Is this a method to get customers to pay more? Or rip them off?