1 reviews | Active since Jun 2015
Telkom - is anybody there?
I have had a Telkom account since 2001. Not once have I failed to pay my account on time and in full. On 17 September 2020 I received my account for August, which included 2 lines under Directory Services Charges, totaling R1137.35 pushing my account from the expected R531.17 to R1668.17. I paid the R531.17 due and immediately phoned the Telkom call centre to enquire after these unknown charges, and was told that they were made by Yellow Pages. I have never had any dealings with Yellow Pages. I was told to contact them directly, which I did at the time. I was informed that the charges concerned a client called Qinelani Clinic which was registered in their records against my Telkom phone number. I informed them that this was their mistake and asked for the charges to be reversed and the faulty registration against my number to be removed. I was told to send an email with all the relevant information to their customer help desk and cancellation departments, which I did on the same day. I received a computer generated response from both addresses and nothing more until my next Telkom account arrived on 14 October with the previous charges shown as arrears, interest on the amount in arrears as well as another charge of R800.40 for Directory Services Charges. I sent another email with all the details to the same 2 addresses at Yellow Pages and received the same computer generated responses. By 29 October I had not received any reply from Yellow Pages, so I tried to contact Telkom for help. Their call centre referred me to their website. Their 1021 number was not attended, except for a taped message to phone later. When our Telkom account arrived in November, it once again included both previous charges with interest and a new charge for R800.40. On 19 November I visited the Telkom branch in the Somerset Mall in Somerset West to request help from the manager. She told me that she has raised a complaint with their Billings Department, and that I could expect a call from them soon to sort out the matter. The call never came. On 14 December I received a computer generated call informing me to pay the arrears on my account or have my service disconnected. So on 15 December I visited the Somerset Mall branch of Telkom once again. The manager once again logged a complaint with Billings Department and told me to expect a call. I insisted on her making the call and letting me speak to them while at the branch. She asked them to phone me immediately, which they did while she was with me. I started explaining the problem, but they disconnected the call after 20 seconds. The manager once again asked them to phone me. This time the phone rang once and the call was terminated from their side. She then instructed me to try to sort the promblem out with Yellow Pages. I said that I had done all I could to get a response from Yellow Pages but to no avail. She suggested that I try to sort the matter out with Qinelani Clinic. I said that that was not possible, since I do not know where this clinic is, and that the problem must be solved by Telkom, since they included the charges on my account and they threaten to terminate my services for no fault of mine. I insisted she make an effort to get the matter rectified. She then contacted their Billings Department and requested the charges be removed from my account. Today I received an sms from Telkom informing me that my "account has been suspended due to Collection". What do I do next? Is there any way to get somebody from inside Telkom to respond?
