Telkom - the worst ever company

I took out two landlines (one to act as a telephone and the other as fax) I also took out an ADSL line. January last year, 2018, I went over to fiber (vuma), with the wrongful adverti*****t that once I take this service that the Telkom line would be cancelled. It was not. I paid for both for several months. I had to downgrade and this service took several months as well. I wanted to cancel all Telkom services and followed the telephone prompts, spoke to many assistants, for days. I filled the application online in November last year, which somehow was not successful. I continued to try to cancel my services. A second internet application was filled in and nothing happened for both December 2018 and January 2019. It took until February this year for someone to call me back. He promptly cancelled my phone line but the internet line continued to run and thus I continued to be charged for it. Another assistant told me that it would take 1 to2 days to cancel the services. This did not happen. A third assistant told me that it would take a month. This still did not happen!

At the same time I placed all Telkom charges on a monthly debit bank order capped with the amount I was told I would be charged. This did not work accordingly either. I kept on being charged over the said limit and when I inquired with my bank, I had been charged more than the agreed upon amount, over many months. It appeared that I had credit with Telkom of over R 6000. I apparently had two accounts with them and the monthly payments went to the 'wrong' one?

Finally, yesterday, I went to the bank to cancel the order. I was told that I am one member of a 'club' in Durbanville area who are trying to cancel their accounts with Telkom and this has been running for months. The bank told me that they cannot help me! I was told that they can reverse the charge and block this month's account but the following month the same would happen as Telkom uses different ways to get the money they are 'owed'. The only thing I can do according to the bank is keep on asking them the reverse the charges, every month! for which I will also be billed by the bank. The practical advice I was given by the bank assistant was to complain in this platform as well as on Ambudsman and to do the banking "games" to stop the order and keep on reversing the charges. Telkom is a state-owned company which does not work at all! It is the worst public service, below any professional or moral standards. I want to get rid of Telkom and go to a decent professional service provider, obviously a private company. I hope this can be sorted out promptly and I would like to know how!