Heartless disregard for the plight of the Tourism Sector

We are a game lodge business in the Greater Kruger area. At the start of the COVID-19 crisis, we moved quickly to scale down operations and save on any unnecessary costs. High on the list of priorities was removing any exposure to debt. We immediately sold 2 of our company vehicles, both of which were fitted with Netstar tracking devices. In July 2020, when the vehicles were sold, we contacted Netstar requesting these vehicles to be removed from our account. We had originally signed a contract with Netstar back in 2014 that required a one month written notice period to cancel a contract on a vehicle that was linked on our account. Netstar, however, informed us that the monitoring systems on the 2 vehicles concerned had been upgraded in 2019, and we were now tied into a 3 year contract that would attract cancellation fees. As a tourism business, faced with a complete shutdown due to national lockdowns, we approached Netstar for relief on cancellation fees. We forwarded support letters from SATSA asking financial institutions and suppliers to consider financial relief for tourism businesses which were under extreme financial stress due to no income prospects for the 2020 year. All of these requests fell on deaf ears and initially we had either no response from Netstar, or the response was simply that we must settle the cancellation fees. In the meantime, Netstar continued to charge us the monthly debit orders on the tracking systems for the 2 vehicles that we had already sold. On checking our contract, I found that firstly we had a signed contract that only required 1 month notice period for cancellation, and secondly that the upgrades in 2019 had been at the request of Netstar, and not ourselves. Furthermore, during the upgrade process, we had never signed or agreed to a 36 month contract, and had never been informed about the cancellation fees. When we asked Netstar to send us proof of our agreement with them on these 36 month contracts, we were sent a "Confirmation of Contract" letter from Netstar. This letter did not have any signature or agreement from our side. I have requested Netstar to forward us any signed documentation showing that we have agreed to a 36 month contract, or even phone recordings which have us agreeing to these contracts. None of the proof requested has been forthcoming from them. Now, in February 2021, 8 months since we began engaging with Netstar on this issue, their response to our continued requests for proof of our agreement and/or relief on cancellation fees has been to simply run a debit order with full cancellation fees on the 2 vehicles. Not only this, they have still not removed the 2 vehicles from our monthly invoicing and are continuing to charge us monthly premiums on 2 vehicles that we sold 8 months ago! I have had no choice but to advise my bank to reverse the debit orders and to stop any further debit orders with Netstar. I am also cancelling the remaining two vehicles on our account and will be moving our vehicle tracking to another service provider. Shame on you Netstar for not only showing a heartless disregard for the tourism sector, but also for what looks like complete incompetence in terms of dealing with cancellations of contracts. I will never use Netstar services ever again, and I will recommend that anyone considering vehicle tracking services looks to other suppliers.