Vodacom - Billing issue

Such a pity....

After Vodacom recently helped resolve a previous complaint of mine, and I even responded on hellopeter by acknowledging their assistance, the very next month they messed it up again.

COMPLAINT NO 1

Here is what happened:

I upgraded from a Red VIP to a Red VIP Plus contract in the month of May.

I verbally confirmed the monthly contract amount at less than R1500 per month with the sales consultant. They said this package was on special this month.

However, when I received my very first invoice I was charged R1,841 (excluding VAT) for this contract.

When I phoned the Vodacom call center, I was given a very lame excuse namely that the R1500 I was quoted did not include my cellphone insurance. It was so simple to point out to the call centre agent that I was paying for cellphone insurance separately and it also reflected as a seperate line item. The call centre agent (Itumeleng) then tried to point out that I received a discount on the invoice. However, this discount was for the pro-rata discount because the upgrade did not run the full month (more on that later).

So, what basically happened was that Vodacom is charging me more than the amount to which I agreed with the sales consultant. I would like to hear the recorded version of that conversation. When I tried to resolve this with Customer Care, the sales agent desperately tried to misdirect and justify the mistake by trying to make excuses. Although the sales agent did confirm that this was the quote given to me verbally. However, the sales agent was not interested in resolving the issue, but was only interested in trying to find "believable" excuses so that I will simply think I am wrong.

COMPLAINT NO 2

As mentioned earlier, I upgraded during the course of the month.

My first issue is that I did not receive the data benefits until the new month - so why was I pro-ratad in the first place. But I am willing to overlook that.

My real issue is that Vodacom's calculation simply does not make sense.

Let me illustrate:

Charge for May line rental (old package) R1,128.81 Pro-rata discount given: R329.9 So pro-rata % for old package = 29% which means I in effect I paid for 69% of my old contract.

Charge for June line rental (new package) R1,841.74 Pro-rata discount give: R538.26 So pro-rata % for new package = 29% which means I in effect I paid for 69% of my new contract.

So this does not make sense. How can I pay 69% for old package and 69% for new package on a pro-rata basis. The sum total of these two percentages should add up to 100%

CONCLUSION

Vodacom....please, I really want to believe in you as a company. Why can't you simply get it right from day 1. Why can't your customer care centre's sort out issues as they arise? Why must we resort to public complaints to resolve our issues?