Vodacom 4u store Table Bay Mall - extremely bad service

I have *never* in my life came across such an *********** Vodacom store and we have been customers of Vodacom since 1999.

Please note that I am not upset about Vodacom's service, as we have only ever experienced joy dealing with Vodacom. We are upset with the service received from this branch.

We upgraded on the 25th of May 2018. During the process of the upgrade, I asked Anthony (the manager) of the branch on numerous occasions whether he removed the 1 GB promotional data, to which he responded that he did. He had us sign a paper copy of the agreement on which the 1 GB data still appeared. When I asked him why we are signing this document on which this item still appears, he responded by drawing a pen line through it and his arrogance even went as far as him signing next to the fact that it was "removed". When we got home, we received the electronic copy of the agreement on which the 1 GB data still appeared. I called him, again, to ensure that it was off, to which he, again said yes.

On the 1st of June I received the 1 GB data. When I emailed the store to enquire why I received it, my email got blatantly ignored. I had to call them, again. I, again, received no joy and had to travel all the way from Gardens (Cape Town) to Table Bay Mall (in Bloubergstrand) to sort this out. Anthony was not at the branch when we got there, but his assistant manager, Erin was. She confirmed that he did not remove the 1 GB promotional data as he said he did. She removed it when we got there.

Furthermore, when we took out the contract, we took the Samsung Gear S3 Frontier watch as an add-on. Anthony informed us that they have no stock, and that he is able to obtain stock from the store in Somerset-West. He indicated that he is going there on the next day to go and collect other stock and that we will have the watch on Saturday at 13h00. He booked out the watch (as if we have already received it) and in good faith we signed for it. As an attorney, I understood the risks involved in signing before actually receiving (as according to Vodacom, we are already in possession of the watch). I nevertheless proceeded and signed in good faith.

On Saturday (26 May 2018) we called the store at 14h00, as this was an hour later than what we anticipated to receive the watch. They tried to call Anthony to confirm where the watch is, but they could not get hold of him. They provided us with his cell phone number. We tried to call him, but he never answered his phone. Late that afternoon, the store informed us that we can come and collect the watch at 10h00 on Sunday. 10h00 came and went, but they never called us to inform us that the watch is there. We had to contact them the whole time to ask them what is going on. The entire time, we had to follow up with them. They never, out of there own movement, contacted us to inform us of anything. This went on for a week - we only received the watch the Friday (1 June 2018) This was extremely frustrating! It was their responsibility to inform us. Why did we have to call them the entire time.

Lastly, when we upgraded, Anthony informed us that insurance on this cellphone would have been R 80.00. He then proceeded to state that this option would only include accidental cover and that full comprehensive cover will cost R 180.00. He never mentioned anything about VAT. As a reasonable consumer, I thought that the R 180.00 would include VAT. I, as the consumer, don't have the responsibility to enquire about VAT. When I received my statement of account this month, we noticed that the insurance premium is R221.74 (EXCLUDING VAT). This is gross misrepresentation. I immediately phoned him after I received this statement of account, but, as usual, I received no joy. I spoke to them for 24min and 23seconds, but nothing! He informed us that he would send an email confirming that he removed the insurance as I cannot afford this premium on top of everything else. One would think that the manager of a branch would know better. Anyway, it came to no surprise that he, again, did not email as he undertook to do.

This morning (14J uly 2018) I got fed up and called the Vodacom call centre who connected me to CellSure. CellSure informed me that the only way that they will credit me for these amounts (as my statement included the amount for June and July) was if I get a letter from Anthony confirming that he did in fact misrepresent me. When I confronted Anthony telephonically, he admitted that he said R 180.00, but when I asked him to reduce it to writing he started screaming at me. I'm not sure why he felt the need to scream as I am not the one who is wrong. Fortunately, I recorded the telephone call and I now have proof of this misrepresentation that I can send to Cellsure.

Regardless of the horrifying service received from the Vodacom 4u Table Bay Mall, I must compliment Vodacom and CellSure on their friendly and competent call center staff, who assisted me immediately.