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Friday 14 August 2015

Ask and you shall receive.

I changed my MTN mobile phone subscription from pre-paid to post-paid recently. The technical change from pre-paid to post-paid became effective while I was abroad. A month later I was slammed with an sms informing me of a bill of 225,000 CFA. I didn’t believe my eyes as I counted the zeros in the bill to be sure it was really what it was.
I called a couple of friends in the MTN VIP service in Bastos to complain in vain. I requested a detailed bill and yes, those figures were correct.
I looked in detail and tried to check out the supposed dialed numbers. Everything seemed to fall in place. After all, machines don’t lie right? 

I decided to pay the bill to avoid suspension of my line: act and complain later. One fateful day I received a call from an MTN post-paid customer service agent. After the usual courtesies, he said he would like to know my appreciation of their post-paid services. I took a deep breath and then fired on with my story about the inflated bill etc etc. He was wise in letting talk non-stop because I would not have entertained any interruptions. At the end of my polite ranting he gave me an email address to channel my complaint to.

You bet I sent a very self-explanatory and strongly-worded email contesting the bill. The following day I received an acknowledgement receipt of my complaint. Two days later I was pleasantly informed, with apologies, that they have refunded 213,000 CFA into my account. I am planning to request a cheque because I don’t trust machines anymore. They could just deduct that money without my knowledge. What do you think?

Lesson learnt:
-          Machines are not always right. Maybe they smell the ability of customers and bill accordingly.
-          Do not bill to kill. Some customers know their rights more than you think.


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

welcome back. I was like where is this lady. well i have had enough of this contract. Yes machine did lie to me. I had to call customer service which obviously directed me to one of their call centers in Asia. And ask them if my phone was a telephone cabin or if I was running a business.
That's the final straw by His Grace never going back to contract. They are thieves. Yes it happen to me abroad. They sent me conflicting messages that I had allowance kept reminding me of my balance. That wasn't the case. Never got a refund.

Unknown said...

Thanks for sharing. A lesson learned.

T! Ntemgwa said...

Thank you dear, pls include your name :-)