Vodacom contract upgrade ripoff

My father has 5 contracts with vodacom and in the past when it was time to renew the contract it was relatively easy. Go in, choose a device, do the calculations for the device and package, do the paperwork and walk out. Never had he ever had to pay anything more than R300 or R400 for sim cards or admin fees or whatever.

He got a message stating that his contract is due for an upgrade so he went in like he's done before but this time he was told that in order to get a new device (samsung galaxy a57) he needs to pay R7700 upfront. Since when have you ever had to pay such a ludicrous amount of money upfront for a midrange device on contract? I could understand if it was the new premium range on a lower tier package but this is absolutely nuts!!!!!

It's now caused him to rethink his continued support of vodacom and start to look for another service provider as this is ridiculous.