TELKOM IS A ****

I have been on a 36 months contract with Telkom since June 2022 and I can say I am dissatisfied with the service hence I am here to raise my dissatisfaction.

I had a debit order set with Telkom which was set for the 1st of every month. The debit order went smoothly until the year 2024 and I had to manually make my payments because Telkom was not debiting me. I have called numerous times and I was advised it was a mistake and assured that the debit order is still in place and would automatically be taken the next month but it wasn’t until I got into the norm of paying once I have an invoice on WhatsApp.

My device contract has ended and I want to move to prepaid. I have tried calling, texting and going to your store in Gateway(KZN/Durban) and Pinecrest(KZN-Pinetown) and I have not been assisted. I have requested for call back and when I receive them I am told I will be transferred to another line and give a number(081 180) just in case the line drops because they know the line will drop. I have tried calling the number directly but I have spent at most 2 hours and no picks up.

On the 29th of August, I spoke to a call center representative - I asked for your complaints email and they sent me an incorrect email via text message(***), I tried sending the email and it was rejected.

I went to your Gateway branch on the 30th of July 2025. - Spoke to Lungelo Lucas Thabethe who tried calling the cancellations team but we stayed on the line over an hour and no one picked up. Lungelo also mentioned that they are getting these complaints that customers are not able to get through the cancellations team and they come to the store to try and cancel but they also cannot get through to them. - Lungelo then offered me a better deal because since I am out of contract for the device I am now supposed to pay R112.37 for 500 Telkom-Telkom minutes, 75 all net minutes, 500 sms and 2GB of that. He offered to put me on a contra where I get more data and he mentioned that would be the easiest way to come out of the existing contract since I am having difficulties with getting through to the cancellations team so I can move to prepaid. - Lungelo told me he would be in touch regarding processing the new contract. I got a call from him on the 11th of August 2025 and he told me that he is still processing it and I might have to pay to have the deal activated and I agreed but I have not heard from him since then. I have not had any feedback whether it was declined or not. I went to your branch in Pinetown on the 10th of September 2025. - I spoke to store manager and explained all the above and the manager asked that I wait for a lady who was on lunch who would assist me with moving my number to prepaid. - The lady came and sent an email and told me that I would receive an email confirming that my number has been moved to prepaid in the next 3 working days. Today is the 16th of September and I have not received the email confirmation.

I have mentioned above that Telkom has not been processing the direct for over a year but on the 30th of August on a Saturday, Telkom debits me. I reversed the debit order because as far as I am aware, I don’t have an instruction with Telkom let alone on the 30th on a Saturday.

I have also woken up to a negative balance R324.72 in my bank account today, Telkom tried to debit an amount of R224.72 and because the funds were not available I was charged a Fee of R100. I have reversed the debit order again but I am still left with a negative balance of R107.02. Telkom has put me in a bad financial position.

I have requested numerous times to get a complaints email but all the emails I have been given have been rejected. Telkom has passed my debt to a collection agency.