Do NOT trust Telkom Mobile with your debit account details!!!

Item: Telkom
Rating: 1
Author: Niclas R

Friends, do NOT trust Telkom Mobile with your debit account details. They will take funds out of your account without your authority and then fight to pay you your OWN money back. How hard can a reversal be, one might ask? Well, whoever you ask, make sure it's not a Telkom Mobile call centre agent or 'supervisor.' They don't even know how to get a hold of their own accounts department, let alone understand how a reversal works. Is your money really safe with people like that? They sure know how to debit funds though, that's for sure. Please, I implore you, don't opt for payment via debit with Telkom Mobile. Do NOT give them your banking details. Pay your account with them manually. In fact, rather be safe than sorry and NOT take out an account with them at all. Allow me to explain why... I have been out of employment since December last year, but have still managed to make monthly payments to Telkom on-time for my Sony Z2 device, which is on contract. Sadly, the death of an immediate family member brought about alot of unexpected expenses and responsibilities on my part. Being extremely low on funds and obviously, quite distressed and distracted, I was slightly late on my payment for the month of March. I called in to explain my situation to Telkom and they advised that I should make payment within 48 hours in order to avoid drastic measures being taken. I went into an ABSA bank and made a manual payment, well within their 48 hour grace period. I assumed everything would now be in order but as it would appear, I was obviously mistaken. On the 25th April, a total of R1259.40 was deducted from my account. We had assumed that this was an error until we checked the Telkom statement and realized that we were being billed roughly R584 for the device, which was correct, and then R672 for the overdue amount for the month of March.I had already made this payment well within the given time frame, it should not have been debited from my account at all!! The maximum number of days that any FSP-FSP payment can take to reflect is 3 days. Telkom's accounts department should have seen this payment long before the 25th of April. How can a team that handles the moneys of thousands of clients be so ***********? Regardless, the contract I signed stated that all debits will be made on the last day of the month. Telkom had no authority to deduct any funds on the 25th! This is a breach of contract! On the 28th April, I called in to request a reversal, and was advised that this would take upto 3 days and that a call had been logged in my name. 9 days later we had still not heard back from their team. I called in again on the 7th of May and that was when things got extremely ugly. I first spoke to an agent who was completely clueless about what would be the procedure to reverse the charges. I asked to speak to a supervisor. She put me on hold for 20 minutes and then cut my call!!!!! Upon calling back a second time, I was extremely stern with the next agent, who only then connected me to the floor manager, Sihle Sithole. Sihle was not at all helpful to us. He said that the only thing he could do was log a call on CRM, and wait upto 7 working days only for someone to get back to us regarding our case! This is the biggest load of bull we have ever heard. We already waited 9 days without hearing back from them and I am in desperate need of these funds. I am currently short paying on other accounts and receiving summons, because of the funds that Telkom took out of my account without my authority. We asked Sihle to please give us his email address aswell as the email of his superior(s). I received false recipient delivery notes from the mails I sent thereafter, he obviously gave me **** contact details!! I wonder if the names he gave me were even real. This is just too much!! <span id="docs-internal-guid-4f54dbf3-a4b8-8ff7-f226-e8d711f598f2" style="font-size: 16px; font-family: Arial; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">This is not our first bad experience with Telkom. When I first opened up my account at the Mall@Redds Telkom branch, they somehow opened up two accounts on my name, which took close to 6 months for them to rectify. 6 frikkin months??! Seriously?? Do their employees really have the s****s and qualifications needed to handle the moneys of thousands of hardworking and many struggling South African citizens? I had to physically go into the busiest of banks every month for 6 months to reverse and make manual payments. How *********** can they possibly be??? <strike></strike> I do not recommend Telkom Mobile to anyone moving forward, their deals may be great but is it really worth it for a device that hardly picks up network? Is it really worth it to have to deal with such *********** client care agents on a regular? To hold for hours and not have any assistance? To wait 18 days, and still not receive your OWN money back? Frankly, I suggest you pay those few rands extra at Vodacom/CellC/MTN, and atleast sleep comfortably knowing that you are receiving good service.

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Replies (1)

Telkom's replyOfficial

13 May 2016, 17:32

Hi NKRReview, Thank you for making contact with us. This response serves as confirmation that your query has been received and we will contact you. We do apologize for any inconvenience we have cause to you. Your reference number is: SM233081 Regards Luleka Telkom Social Media Team

Telkom's reply13 May 2016, 17:32

Official