Terrible Customer Service

I have never made a formal complaint before, however the service I have received at Telkom and distress and the inconvenience it has caused me has compelled me to do so. I decided to switch cell phone service providers and went to the Telkom store in at Greenstone shopping mall on 8 December 2017. I provided all the relevant documents to Sharon and was advised that the system was not working and that I must take the Telkom Sim card and that she would call me tomorrow to finalise the porting process. By 2 pm the next day I did not receive any calls and tried calling the number Sharon provided me, numerous times without success. I then sent through my concerns on the mobile survey and was called on 11/12/2017 by Sharon's manager who advised that she will call me the next day to finalise the port. Nobody contacted me until 14/12/2017 when Sharon called to assist in porting the number and further, seemed highly annoyed with me on the phone and kept re-iterating that she tried calling me. After verifying the cell phone was mine she advised that it will be ported in 24 to 48 hours at which time my current sim will stop working. On 17/12/2017 my current sim was still functioning and the number was not ported to Telkom. I tried calling the Greenstone branch numerous times but no one answered. I called the helpline and the person I was put through to, advised me that no port application was made. She advised that I can manually do it by smsing my Id no and sim serial no. in a prescribed manner which I did on the same day. A week later the port to Telkom had still not occurred and while I was at the Nicolway Mall, I went to the Telkom Branch there and spoke to Tebogo and advised him of the situation and his response was that he cannot assist me and that I will have to go to the specific branch that assisted me or call them, I asked if there was no way he could check on his system for progress; I was told that each branch has a different system and there was nothing he could do, he did not offer to follow up or contact the store to enquire about the delay; even though the store was empty and there were three employees present. As calling the Greenstone Branch was futile in the past, I just gave up and remained with my current network.

On 25/12/17 my current phone stopped working and I decided to get a contract and have my prepaid number ported once more but on contract. Even though I had received poor service a few weeks ago from Telkom, the contract deals seemed reasonable and I didn't think there could possibly be an issue a 2nd time. On 27/12/2017 I went to the Nicolway Mall Telkom branch and was assisted by Tebogo once more to obtain a contract, I provided all my documents and was told that a response on my application will be received in 24 to 48 hours, I was also alarmed at the lack of product knowledge as most of my questions were referred to another employee who answered the questions but I nevertheless trusted that I was in good hands. On 30/12/2017 I went back to the Nicolway Branch for feedback and I was told that there has been no feedback, I asked if there was anything he could do and he said no; we will just have to wait for feedback. Whilst at the store, I saw the 80 gig Internet bundle which was on promotion, the next day being the last day to apply as the promotion would end. I asked if I could also apply for that and was told I couldn't until I receive a response on my cell phone contract; I advised that the promotion will expire after tomorrow and can’t he contact someone, as surely they would make an exception given the circumstance of the expiring deal and I am willing to take a 2nd contract, to which he advised that he should receive feedback on my application by tomorrow and he will call me to give me the outcome and I could come back to the store to apply for the Internet Contract but right now there is nothing he can do to assist in applying for that offer. The offer expired and I never received and feedback.

Over the next week, I called the store every day, numerous times and no one answered the phone. This was extremely frustrating as I was not given feedback.

By 06/01/18 I had not received any feedback regarding my application; I tried calling the store 7 or 8 times, without anyone taking my calls. After trying for an hour I got through to Tebogo who advised that he will make a follow up and call me back. After 10 minutes he called me back and informed me that there has been no feedback. I asked if there was anything he could do as it is now taking a long time and I am without a phone and have been using my sim card in a tablet. He advised me that there was nothing he could do whatsoever. I asked if he could please contact the department that deals with processing of applications, to which he rep**** that he cannot, there is no contact numbers and no way to contact that department save for making a case allocation, beyond that there was no remedy to assist me. At this point I was frustrated and asked if there was a way I could escalate it to a manager and complain as it seemed that he could not assist me, I was then miraculously given a number to call to get assistance; I explained that I had been waiting for such a long time and that I had been borrowing phones to call Telkom and if he could make the calls for me as it felt ridiculous that I had to jump through hoops to get feedback, he seemed frustrated but nevertheless agreed and requested that I give him until Monday to get feedback.

On Monday, 08/01/2018, Tebogo called me on my Tablet but he could not hear me so I requested he call on a friend’s number to take his call; he asked me various security questions and told me he would call me the next day to provide me with the outcome.

On 09/01/2018, I had not received feedback as promised and went to the Nicolway branch after work. Tebogo was not in on that day and I spoke to another lady who could not see feedback on the system so she requested the Assistant manager Ananecia to assist me, Ananecia looked through the system and advised that Telkom has stated that due to me not have a long enough credit History, the contract will only be approved unless I make a deposit of R 2000 first.

This whole process has extremely frustrated me, as it took Telkom 2 weeks to tell me that I need to pay R 2000. I had waited this long and endured the inconvenience in the anticipation that the claim would be favourable; I fail to understand why it would take so long and why nobody took the time or cared to assist someone who wanted to become a customer. R2000 is not a lot of money, but it is a lot to ask for, for a R250/month contract and after having me wait for two weeks and then beg, keep calling and when that fails to go to the store to get some semblance of an outcome. I have also never heard of a network asking for a deposit; you either approve it or you don’t.

I have been with my current service provider for over 14 years and have received great service but only decided to change due to the lower data costs offered by Telkom. It’s disheartening that I had to wait 2 weeks to get negative feedback, if I was advised of this a few days after applying it would not have irked me.

To take this long and then be told I need to make a payment had made me extremely upset. Nevertheless, I was open to making payment and asked if I made payment now; would I get the phone immediately, I was advised I would not as I need to send proof of payment to the store which will then be sent to another department to give an approval thereafter. After hearing this, I had become more frustrated and subsequently lost faith in this company as there seems to be no proper systems in place to communicate between the different departments and I was afraid I would have to wait another 2 weeks. Further, when I asked the assistant manager how the R 2000 deposit would affect my monthly payments; will the monthly payments be decrease or would the number of months I would have to pay be decreased?

I was advised that she does not know how it works but she thinks maybe they subtract the months you would pay back. I also asked if this would be inserted into the contract I would sign, she said yes it would; I then asked if she had a template for this on file or would she have to request it as I did not want to have to wait further when they realise that they do not have a contract for this situation; she said she would have to find out and get back to me.

Due to the service I had received trying to become a customer, the lack of communication systems in place between departments, the lack of willingness to assist and lack of pertinent knowledge by the employees I have dealt with, I am deeply disappointed and have reserved not to proceed with my application due to the inconvenience this company has put me through as I have been left without a phone, I have not helped with an Internet contract and will in all probability have to go through another application process with another network after having gone through such a terrible experience.

The whole reason I wanted to switch to Telkom in the first place was to save on data costs, however, due to me recharging small amounts at a time while waiting for my number to be ported and thereafter I contract, so as not to have any data forfeited I have actually ironically, ended up spending more money. I endured the terrible service until now because Telkom has great products which I was really interested in, unfortunately the service has fell short.