The Telkom Trap

<p>I app**** for a Telkom line at my new residence earlier this year, after a few weeks the line was installed, at first I asked for a 4Mb/s Uncapped line, the technician brought a Huawei router along although I did not ask for one (I had a D-link of my own). We struggled with the connection and speed, I called Telkom and they send a tech out for us, he said the router the previous guy installed is faulty (it was n new one the guy opened at my house) long story short we switched back to my trusty old DLINK like I intended to, I phoned Telkom so the tech can come and collect the faulty router as I didn’t want it from the start. Telkom then charged me unnecessary call out fee as a faulty router is considered the clients fault and not Telkom. </p> <p>We continued to struggle with bad connection; I could not even stream Netflix or Show max in 720p, I was told 4Mb/s is good enough for full HD (1080p). I called time after time, they would reset my stuff on their side and it would work for the rest of the day, i decided to rather cancel (I was on month to month) and move my service to Afrihost as I have used them at my previous residence with no problems. They told me it will be 3 to 4 weeks for my line to be moved to the holding pool. I sent requests to cancel multiple times. I have been cancelling from April. On May 10 I send all the forms and copy of my ID to them again. It took so long to get the line moved to holding pool that I asked them to make my line 10Mbs for the remainder of the waiting time in hope to at least being able to use the internet until I can move to Afrihost. At that time there was 3 options for uncapped 10Mb/s internet, the One I chose was about R750 to R800 a month, after another long time a received a account from Telkom, they charged me close to R1500 per Mont for the 10Mb/s package, I was not told that the packages has changed and 10Mb/s only have one option now. Or at least this is what I was let to understand. It is July now and my line is still not moved to holding pool, I keep getting billed for a month to month service I don’t want. I managed to speak to a lady at Telkom (via telephone customer service) whom understood my frustration and she and her supervisor helped me (or so they said) this was beginning to middle June, she told me that her supervisor is personally handling the situation and it would be 5 to 7 days for the line to be moved to holding pool, nothing came of that, I tried phoning after that and every time I keep getting told the call center don’t handle holding pool queries and I must send cancellation form and wait for them to call me, they newer call!!! they just keep billing me, I can’t count the number of times I called and begged to just set the process in motion, no success, I sent the cancellation letter MULTIPLE times with nothing more than a automated email response "we received your landline cancellation request" I wish n never app**** for internet at Telkom, It is my opinion that Telkom is refusing to help me, -how can it possibly take this long- or they just have absolutely no capable customer service.</p> <p>I can’t be held responsible for the outstanding balance as this is clearly a fault from Telkom’s side, I did everything according to “the book” but Telkom is not doing their part.</p> <p>Pieter Labuschagne</p>