5 Evils in Cell Phone Services Companies Which Deserve Ocampo’s Attention

There are many mistakes and evils we have to endure while looking for service from the cellphone services operators. The companies. some using the excuse of low charges now to torture us with executive arrogance and inaction must be told off. I get irritated when people expect me not to complain just because they are used to shida from the operators.

I have come with some problems which I think can be solved by the operators getting their acts together. And they are;

Watchmen as Customer Care Reps

This is very common and though I have experienced it at Airtel and Safaricom outlets, I have complained before and continue to complain but I am told that Orange shops now practice it more than anyone else. You get into a shop to look for service and approach someone wearing the uniform of the company (Orange, Airtel or Safaricom).

To rid the problem they think is you and avoid solving your problem, they send you to a watchman to sort your problem out. Or you simply get the watchman taking charge of the shop like Safaricom I&M where there are many attendants but you still get watchmen and female guard getting behind counters to listen to me while I should only contact watchmen when I have a security problem.

Promotions Galore

This is the evil which I didn’t know was this widespread but I am getting a problem with it in Airtel. I joined Airtel recently and has had issues and they have not been solved. But a bigger problem I discovered is the fact that from Friday to Monday, I have got like 17 promotional SMSes from Airtel and they are not relevant or helpful to me. Seriously Airtel, wake up and stop bombarding me with the promotions even if the service nothing.

Registration of SIM Cards held By Others

Today, an Airtel employee who called to listen to me and not solve my problem, Mr Natembea, told me that they have had problems with Airtel dealers who registers SIM cards which are already out for sale. What happens is that anyone who wants a particular line goes to Airtel shop or dealer and he is issued with the number without the company checking that the same number has been issued for SALE and so cannot be issued to another person without a recall of the already issued SIM card. This is fraud by Airtel because all the dealers and retailers who have to issue numbers must go through Airtel Customer care reps.

This is Airtel stealing from its own dealers and retailers because they are not refunded the money. I bought Airtel line, 0737 944 375, and it is iissued to a Mr Paul who still also have it. The same thing happens in Safaricom where when your line goes dormant, it is issued to a new client in a period of time as small as within 3 months. I know a guy who went to Sudan to look for deals and he came back and found that his line has been issued to someone else. My own uncle has had his line issued to another person.

Customer Care Representative Who are Trained to be Rude

Now this is an area where Orange Kenya leads. I have a CDMA line for 3G+ service and when I have a problem, I call customer care and insist that the call must be recorded so that in case we have a problem, we can pursue with Orange management. The people manning the call centre will tell you that it is being recorded even when they are not ready to record because of their character. The second thing I insist on is that A customer care rep identify himself or herself with full names so that transparency can be observed.

Many Orange customer care reps wont tell you their names and you would end up with a very useless response to your problem and no way to pursue it because you would, in most cases, be left with one name like “James”. But a good number of people tells me that it is as a result of the management tolerating it.

Unlawful Deduction of Airtime

This is common in operators and they most of the time try to use it to correct their books. I have been told by sources in Safaricom and Airtel that the operators have in many instances deducted Ksh 2 – Ksh 100 from various lines depending on how much they load into their phones. If an operator was to deduct Ksh 50 from 1 Million subscribers. What would happen? 50 Million shillings without much sweat.

Another type of deduction is where we have premium services operators lure clients into promotions. It always happen that you contribute to a charity like Redcross and then after a few months, the premium service operator will put you into a different list and you get money deducted from your account for services which you didn’t request.

Do you know of any evil we might have forgotten or ignored, leave in the comment below.