Mis-sold contract: Store refused to port number as promised

On 7th January 2025, I contacted Vodacom online sales with the goal of purchasing a 36-month contract for an iPhone 15. I was contacted by a sales agent and told that I would be able to port my old Telkom contract number to the Vodacom number. After successfully entering into the contract and receiving my handset, I was never given an opportunity to port my old number.

I then went to the Cape Town V&A Waterfront Vodacom store and asked how I could port my old Telkom number to the Vodacom contract. The store clerk there informed me that I needed to go to Telkom and request them to cancel my contract and move my SIM to prepaid and then come back to Vodacom to do a SIM swap. I did this but when I came back, the store clerk had left and the staff at the store said (very rudely) that I wouldn't be able to use my old Telkom number on the Vodacom contract, since my contract SIM had already been activated.

I contacted customer support to try and have this issue resolved, but they told me the same thing and that there was no way for them to port the number. I am now left with a contract which I cannot use, since it is tied to my old number. In the year and a half since activating the contract, I have not been able to find any way to resolve this online, and Vodacom's customer help line now redirects me to a ChatBot which cannot resolve this issue.

If I cannot use my old number for the new contract, then that should have been explained during the initial sale and the store staff should have offered me some kind of help.