Vodacom: From incompetence to torture

For my entire life I used vodacom without a problem, until I got a cellphone contract from them. Within a month they managed to destory any good will I had from them.

It started with mistakes of airtime allocated to my 2 sim cards, then when I wanted my phone repaired in the first month that LG mentioned was a mistake on the phone, Vodacom employees flatout ignored me and refused to listen to anything I had to say. After repeatedly refuting anything I have to say (They were actively rude to me, inexperienced and had few answers for anything I had to ask. Answers like "Just because that's the way it is" aren't acceptable.) They also tried to rush me through paper work and got irritable when I read over the papers I were signing and showed a lack of common decency when I requested a pin to open my phone and take out the sim card.

Upon the repair process, they were dishonest upon the repair process and pricing (The first SMSes said it would be free, if I didn't ask after they called me I wouldn't have heard that they instead were going to charge me) and even after being exhausted and just telling them to fix the phone for a very large price, they had to call me at work again for a 3rd time unsure of what they had to do. I requested that they just send the phone back instead. (This also took a long time to verify)

Other annoyances included having to pay for caller ID. A service which no-one (at the stores/call centers / anywhere) could explain why that's there. Of course the honest answer would be because Vodacom can get away with it. Oh I should mention, your website says to use the helpline, your helpline also says to use the app, your app does very little. Eventually I just had to stay on hold until I could get someone in a call center to help me. (Honestly, vodacom's website is a damn trainwreck for getting support)

Then I kept receiving tons of SMSes at midnight each night which would wake me, so now Vodacom has actively started ruining my health as well. I had enough when Vodacom started making automatic purchases on my account with my airtime that I did not give consent for. I've spent so much time with the current contract trying to get assistance including a refund, but they just refused the help me again.

Of late I've been trying to cancel my contract repeatedly (5 times now) and no-one has gotten back to me or been able to help me. Emails don't receive feedback (1 did) and the line keeps getting dropped when I call support.

I was willing to find a middle ground with the contract and keep on at least using vodacom as a service provider, but I doubt they're willing to do anything. At this point it's going to be easiest to just stop paying them until they call me.

I just can't believe this level of incompetence and disrespect exists in a company, and that no-one there has any interest in keeping a customer.