After any many many many years of supporting Vodacom and their progress from a media perspective, we are writing this article as a customer (and very like no longer a customer) with absolute frustration and anger! Let us explain why…
We currently have 3 (contract) accounts with Vodacom with 1 primarily being used for this brand as the main account for way longer than 10 years. Anyway, one of the accounts were going to end on 4th October 2024. After careful consideration and seeing the backlog/waiting period on the iPhone 16 Pro/Pro Max we decided not to renew the contract as we have a contract expiring in December as well and would rather re-new that one when stock was readily available then.
Last week Friday (11 October 2024), we walked into a store in an Umhlanga Mall (Durban) and they did have stock of 1 iPhone 16 Pro so we decided to attempt getting that one immediately. Unfortunately it could not due to the cancellation being processed for the contract we opted not to renew. So we called the cancellations department to cancel the cancellation at the store so we could now do the upgrade, the consultant apparently cancelled the cancellation but it just never reflected. Later on in the day, we called again to see why it wasn’t cancelled and the consultant said it was incorrectly done and he will now cancel it and asked us why we were doing this so we had explained due to 1 device now being available at the store and we would like to upgrade immediately. THE ENTIRE REASON OF WANTING TO DO THIS UPGRADE IS TO GET THE DEVICE IMMEDIATELY AND NOT HAVE TO END UP ON A WAITING LIST OR BACKLOG!
This is when the absolute crap and lies began…
The retention consultant said no hold on – they have plenty of stock available as they are part of the retentions department and work differently from retail stock. We kept asking over and over if he is sure about stock because we have been looking around for weeks and made him well aware of the reason in upgrading now is purely because the device was in stock at the store! Otherwise we would not have done this upgrade. He insisted on the recorded call it was available immediately and if we upgraded on the call there we would not pay any additional fees like we would when upgrading at the store ie. Sim activation fee etc. Bare in mind, this call is being recorded so we felt pretty assured. We were even told we will receive the device Tuesday-Wednesday this week. Tuesday being TODAY! So anyway the quote was generated and emailed to us he said someone would call us to confirm the upgrade within 48 hours. We received no call at all, so we called again yesterday (MONDAY) and to follow up on progress of the order, and guess what? We are told we are on the backlog as the devices are not in stock or available! Which was the whole point of wanting to get this device from the store!!!
What we would like to know is that, why are we being blatantly lied to as customers?! We have requested the call recording from the last Friday as proof of the blatant lies. We have also posted this issue on Hellopeter as well as forwarded to media relations at Vodacom.
If we do not receive concrete feedback regarding this order and delivery of the device by Thursday this week – we will be cancelling all of our accounts with Vodacom and moving over to another mobile network provider by this Friday.
Updates to follow on this article…
