MTN depletes Airtime and not Data Bundles and doesnt seem to care about the problem

<p>Sent: 14 December 2016 01:09 PM<br /> To: ********** ********** ********** /> Cc: PA to Mr P Livanos; 'Peter Livanos'<br /> Subject: RE: Attention Management of MTN Billing Dept 083 *** ***x<br /> Importance: High<br /> Sensitivity: Confidential</p> <p> </p> <p>Further to my email below, I have just received yet another SMS from you:</p> <p>(12h48 14 December 2016)</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p>From: Complaints Management Team MAIN ********** <br /> Sent: 13 December 2016 11:42 AM<br /> To: Peter Livanos<br /> Subject: Re: RE: Attention Management of MTN Billing Dept 083 *** ***x [# ********** 8]<br /> Dear Valued Customer.</p> <p>This auto response serves as an acknowledgement that the email address has been decommissioned. <br /> For urgent attention, you may contact us by dialling 808 (free from any MTN contract cell phone number) or +2783 1 808 from any other service provider (calls are charged at standard cellular rates).Did you know, you can email our Customer Care Team on: <br /> ********** /> Did you know, you can also chat to us on the link below:<br /> http://www.mtnsp.co.za/Support/ContactUs/Pages/ContactUs.aspx<br /> Did you know, you can also log a complaint on our Social Platform: <br /> https://twitter.com/mtnzaservice <br /> <br /> Should your query relate to any of the below, contact numbers have been supp****:</p> <p>Account Suspensions or proof of payments: Email: ********** <p>Data Support: Dial 1555 (free from an MTN contract cell phone number) or + ********** 5 from any other service provider (calls are charged at standard cellular rates) </p> <p>Insurance Helpdesk: Dial + ********** 6084 (free from an MTN contract cell phone number) or + ********** 6084 from any other service provider (calls are charged at standard cellular rates)<br /> HVRC (Repairs) Helpdesk: Collection Call Centre: ********** <br /> Technical Call Centre: ********** <br /> Coverage Helpdesk: Dial + ********** 1212 (free from an MTN contract cell phone number), from any other service provider (calls are charged at standard cellular rates)<br /> Roaming tips:<br /> http://www.mtn.co.za/Travel/Pages/MTNRoaming.aspx</p> <p>MTN Packages and Rates: https://www.mtn.co.za/everyday_services/useful_extras/Pages/YelloTrader.aspx<br /> Kind Regards,<br /> Customer Care<br /> MTN SA</p> <p> </p> <p>From: Peter Livanos <br /> Sent: 13 December 2016 11:15 AM<br /> To: ********** /> Cc: PA to Mr P Livanos; 'Peter Livanos'<br /> Subject: RE: Attention Management of MTN Billing Dept 083 *** ***x<br /> Importance: High<br /> Sensitivity: Confidential</p> <p> </p> <p>Further to my email below, I have just received yet another SMS from you (10h43 13 December 2016)LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p>with regret: I have to take a huge amount of my time to address my complaint in writing to you after I've spent so much time on the telephone with your MTN champions trying to resolve the matter, but to no avail:</p> <p> </p> <p>I have been with MTN since 1996 and would consider myself a loyal customer and I hope that at the outset your intentions are to truly look after your clients.</p> <p> </p> <p>Changed from contract to prepaid:</p> <p>I have been purchasing a month-to-month data bundle for quite some time now since I cancelled my contract with MTN and became a prepaid user, naturally due to the cost and saving implications. Certainly not the convenience as I have been going through such a difficult time with yourselves.</p> <p> </p> <p>New data bundle option:</p> <p>Last month I noticed an option I had never seen before when recharging my data bundles. Just so you understand my perspective I've always considered empty ends data bundles to be rather expensive compared to what the competition is offering. While I am drafting this email I'm wondering whether I should still even be a client of yours.</p> <p> </p> <p>Background of the problem:</p> <p>Back to the problem at hand which I would like result. You will notice over the past period of time I generally consume between 300 to 500 MB of data per month. So for quite some time now I have been purchasing the 300 MB data bundles monthly.</p> <p> </p> <p>New data bundle option:</p> <p>Last month I noticed a new option which offered a package that if you paid MTM upfront for six months you would get 500 MB of data, per month at a much better rate than renewing the data bundle every 30 days. Naturally I was happy when I saw this as it also meant that I did not have to recharge every single month. I attach copies of the screenshots recording same:</p> <p> </p> <p>SCREENSHOTS FROM 2016 11 18</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p>As I'm sure you can clearly see from the above on 18 November 2016 I purchased the above 6 x 500mb data bundle.</p> <p> </p> <p>Over the next period of time until about last week I could not understand why my airtime was being depleted so rapidly. In fact the one day I tried to make a call in for the first time in my life did I hear that I had no a time when I made a telephone call. You will see from your records I immediately loaded another R500.</p> <p> </p> <p>Erroneous depletion of data due to bad application:</p> <p>To my shock I realised that a huge amount of data depleted from my phone from approximately 5 Dec – 8 Dec. there was unfortunately a problem with my email program and was wasting my data.</p> <p> </p> <p>Interim 1 GB two week data bundle:</p> <p>I immediately fix the problem on my cell phone and I loaded a new data bundle as per your special on the options menu to load 1 GB for two weeks until the new 500 MB would kick in on 18 December 2016.</p> <p> </p> <p>MTN system error:</p> <p>Again to my shock and dismay I noticed that your system is not using my data bundle but rather it is consuming my airtime and this is confirmed in the SMS's that you have sent me:</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p>Appealing to your helpline for assistance, for the first time: disgusting call agent</p> <p>I was so disappointed when I'd seen this and decided to contact your helpline to speak to one of your MTN champions. I called in the morning just after I'd received this SMS and as you can see from the timestamp it was 10:11 AM. Your records will show that I called the cell who was most unhelpful. After a long and frustrating telephone call with her she advised that the SMS is that I had received were incorrect and from her records on the system it clearly showed that the data bundle is being depleted and that my airtime is not being depleted whatsoever. This infuriated me as I could clearly see from her capabilities in the way in which he handled the telephone call I do not think that she was trained properly and had the technical proficiency to deal with the problem at hand.</p> <p> </p> <p>MTN does not have managers or supervisors over the weekend:</p> <p>When I asked her to transfer me to a manager she advised me that there are no managers over the weekend and I further confirmed with her that no one is there monitoring her conduct, to which again she confirmed.</p> <p> </p> <p>I'm not sure what kind of an organisation you guys are running that I honestly thought that you are a first tier company with excellent technical and call centre staff and would obviously have supervisors and management in place to back up the staff in situations they could not assist or deal with. I would like a formal response to this please and I'm sure that you should pick up the voice recording quite easily on your side.</p> <p> </p> <p>Back to the problem at hand:</p> <p>However, this is not the focus of my complaint as the focus of my complaint is that you are not using my data bundles that I've purchased but rather choosing to consume my airtime whilst my data bundles are barely being used. With respect this is not fair and is disgusting especially how many times I've called your MTN champions to correct the situation.</p> <p> </p> <p>So I called you helpline back at 16h24 on the same day i.e. 11 December 2016.</p> <p> </p> <p>Second attempt at calling your helpline with excellent staff for agent:</p> <p>The agent was much more professional and polite and understood the problem almost immediately. She advised me to punch in a code on my phone and this would immediately correct the situation: *141*5# option 1 then option 1… to implement data</p> <p> </p> <p>Request for escalation in credit to be implemented immediately:</p> <p>I also asked her to please ensure that I am correctly credited for the amounts that MTN have incorrectly deducted from my airtime. She confirmed that she would escalate this to the appropriate management who would ensure that after investigation my request was effected correctly. She actually advised that she is going to confirm this with the manager which I found most amusing is the agent earlier that day advised that there are no managers on duty during the weekend. I certainly believe that you need to institute a serious disciplinary hearing against your agent from the early morning telephone call. She may not treat human beings with such disrespect. We are all entitled to respect and dignity.</p> <p> </p> <p>Voice recording:</p> <p>I attach the voice recording for your ease of reference should it be necessary to refer to the telephonic conversation. However, I would urge you to listen to the telephonic conversation with her as it clearly sets out what the problem is if you do not understand my concerns raised in this email.</p> <p> </p> <p>MTN system error: no confidence and requires human intervention by senior management</p> <p>I raise a further concern with her that since your organisations’ systems have messed up my billing so many times over the last couple of weeks I have absolutely no confidence that your system will automatically correct itself after the 1 GB two-week data bundle has depleted and must automatically go back to the monthly 500 GB package that I have already purchased upfront last month. She advised me that if the system does not correct itself I should phone in again and they will fix it. Naturally this is extremely frustrating for me and I am not happy how I'm being treated and messed around by your *********** systems as it appears.</p> <p> </p> <p>When choosing the options your agent advised it appeared to be cancelling my 6 x 500 MB data bundle. I'm not quite sure why she suggested that this must be done I can only assume that your systems are not smart enough to have simultaneous data bundles running and your system probably needed to remove the existing 6 x 500 MB data bundle in order to utilise the 1 GB two-week bundle and then after that is expired I'm probably going to have two cancel that one, and then reactivate the original 6 x 500 MB data bundle? To be honest I'm not sure how your systems work only you will know I am simply speculating based upon the extremely unpleasant experience I've had over the past few weeks.</p> <p> </p> <p>Why is this my problem?</p> <p>However I honestly feel that this is not my job and this is what you guys get paid to do and this should be your problem and not mine.</p> <p> </p> <p>Escalation to complaints department:</p> <p>You will note that at the end of the telephone call I specifically asked her for this email address as I intended lodging the complaint against your horrible staff member from earlier that day and also in case her suggestions did not in fact work.</p> <p> </p> <p>All my attempts have failed:</p> <p>Again to my shock and dismay your organisation has gone on further to disappoint me</p> <p> </p> <p>Screenshots from : 2016 12 11:</p> <p>13h19<br />16h40<br /> <br /> <br /> </p> <p>Screenshots from : 2016 12 12:</p> <p>23h56<br /> <br /> </p> <p>Screenshots from : 2016 12 13:</p> <p> </p> <p>09h26<br /> <br /> </p> <p>Conclusion:</p> <p>You can clearly see that something is horribly wrong from the above screenshots. Can one of your highly competent management please look at this whole problem and sort everything out for me please. If this is not sorted out by the end of the day I will publish this on all the various social media platforms as I have noticed over the past couple of months big organisations like yourselves seem to only react and fix problems when it gets ventilated through social media platforms. I'm giving you the opportunity for the end of the day to treat this matter with the urgency that it deserves and fix the situation. Also what concerns me is that as per your agents advice I had to cancel the 6 x 500 MB data option, do I simply lose the amount that I have paid upfront last month, will this be reinstated, will be refunded and/or credited…. What will happen now?</p> <p> </p> <p>I am a man of principle and even though we are talking about small amount of money I do not like being ********** for even one cent.</p> <p> </p> <p>Please be advised that this email is sent for the best intentions and place on record that all my rights are hereby reserved.</p> <p> </p> <p>One of your senior management is most welcome to also telephone me should the need arise. However I stress and reiterate that I will only deal with senior management due to the above I'm not prepared to work with low-level, ill trained staff within your organisation. I trust you can understand where I'm coming from when issuing this request.</p>