Virgin Mobile fiasco – update #5 (closure, HOPEFULLY)

Dare I tempt fate and say it, but I think I’m finally free of Virgin Mobile.  I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but I took a page out of a colleague’s book and made such a nuisance of myself that hopefully they just hurried up the process.

Here’s how it went down:

27/08/2009

You’ll remember that I spoke to “Cole” and the story he gave me.  Well, after I lodged the complaint on Hellopeter I decided to give the call centre another call and just see for myself what the heck was happening.

Honestly, Cole was a smooth-talking fellow, but I didn’t believe one word coming out of his mouth, so I thought I’d try for a second opinion.  Wishful thinking?  Perhaps, but I was quite surprised when I made this phone call.

• 16h09 – Called contact centre, spoke to “Jodene”. Very helpful, very professional, a little more clued-up and pleasant to deal with than some of the other monkeys that staff Virgin mobile’s call centre.

  ME: “Hi Jodene.  I asked to have my post-paid account to be migrated to pre-paid 3 days ago and this has not happened.  What’s taking so long?”
  Jodene: “Hi.  Let me see.  Sir, I’ll have to check with my supervisor, please hold.”
  *Puts me on hold for about 3 minutes*
  Jodene: “Sir, your migration will happen at the end of the month”
  ME: “Okay, that’s fine, but can you make sure that the payments I made are reflecting and that I will NOT be debited on the 1st?”
  Jodene: “You will not be debited if all the payments are allocated. It seems that all is in order.”
  ME: “Jodene, thanks.  Can I ask that you send me an e-mail with everything you just said – that the migration will go through on the 1st, that all payments have been allocated and that I will NOT be debited on the 1st?”
  Jodene: “Sure, what’s the address?”
  ME /gives/ her address, spells it all out twice.
  ME: “Thanks Jodene, I appreciate your help.”
  Jodene: “It’s a pleasure sir, goodbye.”

  At this point I was asked to rate the service and I said that I was satisfied.  Although, i never received that e-mail that Jodene said she would send to me.  I suppose if I had received perfect service from Virgin Mobile I would have been dreaming.

28/08/2009

I quickly popped off to my local FNB Premier Banking suite to put a stop payment order on the Virgin Mobile debit orders, just in case they decided to carry on taking my money for a service that I had already cancelled. 

Overkill, perhaps, but I wasn’t going to take the chance of letting a debit order go through and then sit with a 3-month battle to get a refund. 

My banker said all was in order and that Virgin was not going to get any more of my money without my permission.  Yayness.

• 12h14 – I was in a client meeting so I missed a call from Virgin Mobile in response to my post on Hellopeter.  I got a pretty garbled voicemail that said something along the lines of: “Your account migration has been done and your bank account will not be debited.”  Admittedly the line was pretty bad and the guy leaving the message wasn’t the best English speaker, but I got the gist of the message.
• 13h15 – Did a balance enquiry on my phone to check if my account had been migrated.  First I did a “Credit Account” balance query and it gave me my airtime balance, so I immediately thought that my account was not migrated.  But I then did a “Prepaid Account” query and instead of the usual “Oops, you are a credit account holder…” I got a prepaid balance.  Could it be? Has it happened?

I’m not one to count my eggs before they hatch, so I’m reserving my cry of “FREEDOM!!!” for when I have successfully ported to Vodacom.

Until then, I have about R2,800’s worth of unused Virgin Mobile Airtime to offload.  Thinking of offering it up at a 40% discount to whoever wants it.  I’ll just do an airtime transfer and use the cash to save up for that R3,000 pay-in on a new iPhone 3GS – when there’s actually stock in SA.

Virgin Mobile fiasco – Update #4

So now the story changes from one call centre agent to the next.  You’ll recall that when I spoke to the first call centre agent (here), he said that the migration would happen within 24 – 48 hours of my request.

48 hours later I spoke to another call centre agent (here) who said that the migration would take 3 days.

Now, the story changes AGAIN:

27/08/2009

• 10h30 – Called contact centre, spoke to “Cole”. Nice guy but quite a smooth-talker.

  ME: “Hi Cole, here’s my reference number.”
  Cole: “Rather give me your cell phone number.”
  ME: “Okay, its 0741 xxx xxx”
  Cole: “Right Mr. Callegari, what can we do for you?”
  ME: “I asked to have my contract mig…”
  Cole: “The good news, sir, is that everything has been submitted and it’s on its way to the migrations department.”
  ME: “So it’s not done yet?”
  Cole: “It’ll be done by the 1st of September.”
  ME: “Cole, I was initially told 24 – 48 hours, then 3 days, and now you say by the end of the month?”
  Cole: “Yes, I don’t want to spit out a whole bunch of financial jargon, but because of our financial systems and billing cycles, all our migrations are done in a batch at the end of the month.”
  ME: “Okay, so how can I be sure that my debit order will be cancelled, because it usually goes through on the 1st of the month?”
  Cole: “The debit order will still go through on the 1st.”
  ME: “Even though I paid the last invoice up-front?”
  Cole: “Yes.  You would need to phone us on the last day of the month, let me just check, ja the 31st – that’s Monday.”
  ME: “And what then?”
  Cole: “Then you see will if your account was migrated.  You see, if you had done your cancellation on like the 2nd of the month, you would have to wait an entire month for the cancellation to go through.”
  ME: “I see.  Cole, you’ve been very helpful, but I’d really like to speak to someone in the migrations department.”
  Cole: “No, this IS the Migrations department. But I’m not the one who does the migrations – that’s done by admin people, and they don’t take telephone calls.”
  ME: “Um, they don’t take telephone calls AT ALL?”
  Cole: “Ja, sorry.  But call us again on Monday and we can see from there.”
  ME: “Fine.”
  Cole: “Sir please would you hold to rate our service.”
  ME: “Okay.” – rated “not satisfied”

Either these contact centre agents are clueless, or the system in Virgin Mobile is SERIOUSLY broken and they’re swindling people out of money left right and centre by asking for payments and still debiting accounts. 

Either way, I posted a complaint on Hellopeter here and I’m going to FNB today to put a block on the debit orders from Virgin Mobile.

I just KNEW that this wasn’t going to be an easy process.  I have to say, although MTN’s service was shoddy, at least they cancelled my contract and the tie was cut clean – no baggage.

Virgin Mobile, on the other hand… I can’t get rid of them quick enough.  But it looks like this is going to be a long and very painful journey.

Virgin Mobile fiasco – Update #3

And it continues:

26 August 2009

• 10h50 – Called Virgin Mobile’s call centre. Got through to “Tsego”.  Gave her my reference number.

  Tsego: “You requested to have your account migrated to pre-paid.”
  Me: “Yes.”
  Tsego: “I see that they have not received the request to do so yet.  When did you put the request in?”
  Me: “48 hours ago”
  Tsego: “The process usually takes 3 days.”
  Me: “I was told 48 hours.”
  Tsego: “No sir, it takes 3 days.”
  Me: “Not what I was told previously, but okay.”
  Tsego: “You can try and call us again tomorrow.”
  Me: *sigh* “Okay, thanks.”

To quote an acquaintance: “Virgin take instructions like cats take to herding.”

The Virgin Mobile Fiasco – Update #2

The process of cancelling my Virgin Mobile Contract continues from where it left off here:

24 August 2009

• 09h40 – Called Virgin Mobile call centre (123) to confirm if payments have been allocated.  Call centre agent (forgot his name) says payments have been captured.Me: “Okay, is my account now converted into pre-paid”
  Agent: “Not yet, we need to put in a request for this to be done.  Do you want me to do that now?”
  Me: “Yes please.  how long will it take?”
  Agent: “Usually between 24 – 48 hours.  You’ll get a call to confirm that this has been done.”
  Me: “Okay”.
  Agent: “The request is done.  Please write down this reference number xxxxxxxx, if you don’t get a call in 48 hours, call us back and we’ll see what the status is.”
  Me: “So when this is done, all debit orders against my account will be removed?”
  Agent: “Yes.”
  Me: “Thanks.”

25 August 2009

I thought I’d push my luck and see if the conversion process is done:

• 10h41 – Called contact centre and spoke to “Siyabonga”.  Quite an unhappy person by the sound of things.  He told me that the conversion has not happened yet.Me: “So we’re on track to have this done in 48 hours?”
  Siyabonga: “Yes.”
  *Hangs up*
  Me: “Kthxbai.  Prick.”

Why am I starting to get worried?  Just to be sure, I’m going to FNB tomorrow to put a block on any debit orders from Virgin Mobile – in case they decide to take more money than they’re entitled to as they seem to be accustomed to doing.

And so, it continues….  I’m scared.

Thank you Tintswalo at Waterfall

You may recall my experience recently (here) with a less-than-exceptional birthday breakfast for my father at the Tintswalo at Waterfall hotel.

Well, I’m very happy to say that Francois followed through with his promise and invited us back to the hotel for a “make-up” breakfast (because, as he told me over e-mail – those are the best type of breakfasts!).

It was fantastic and lived up to the unbelievable experience that I have come to expect from this place.  Thank you and well done!

Do yourself a favour, if you haven’t already been there and go to the Tintswalo at Waterfall for breakfast.  And take friends.  It’s SO worth it.

The Virgin Mobile fiasco – Update #1

So I thought I’d document my experiences cancelling that God-forsaken Virgin Mobile contract that I had to suffer through for the last 10 months (See here and here).

18 August 2009

• 12h44 – called Virgin Mobile call centre (123) and spoke to “Conrad”.  Very nice guy – helpful and happy.  Informed me that to cancel my contract all I would have to do is pay the outstanding balance on my handset and convert my post-paid account into pre-paid.  “Then you can port out but you’ll lose your accumulated airtime, which is sitting at R3078.”

20 August 2009

• 10h00 – called Virgin Mobile again, put through to billing enquiries.  Spoke to a “Emmaleen”.  I asked what the process was to cancel my contract.  She said that I must make the final payment for my handset, then fax confirmation through so that she can have the payment allocated against my account. 

  Emmaleen: “But we can’t allocate your payments today, our systems are down.”
  Me: “Your systems are always down.”
  Emmaleen: “Okay, bye.”

• 10h19 – Made payment into Virgin Mobile’s Nedbank account.  Faxed proof of payment through.
• 11h00 – Receive a phone call from Emmaleen confirming receipt of fax.  She informs me that an invoice for September has already been generated and payment for September is still due.

  Emmaleen: “Would you like to pay immediately and then we can cancel your debit orders or do you want to wait until your debit order comes off and cancel later?”
  Me: “No, please cancel it immediately.”
  Emmaleen: “Okay, as soon as you make that payment I’ll send it through to our payments department and we’ll allocate those for you”
  Me: “But if I make a payment now, won’t it affect the amount I paid to settle my handselt?”
  Emmaleen: “That’s up to our ‘WOW’ department who will sort that out.”
  Me: “Okay”. – but secretly inside I’m saying “Oh gods, here we go…”

• 11:11 – Made another payment to Virgin Mobile for September’s invoice and faxed through proof of payment.  Received e-mail confirmation from Emmaleen that she has received faxes and is allocating payments.

Bye bye Virgin Mobile!

 

Here’s the reason this is such a huge thing for me.  I’ve spent the last 14 months horribly regretting ever signing up with Virgin Mobile and today I did some calculations and realised that if I cancelled my agreement, I would actually be saving money for the next few months. 

Some of you (*koff* @ambio) would say that it’s about bloody time.

You see, I’m on a fairly high-end package (R599 per month) and every time I think about parting ways with that amount of money for a service that is well below average, I keep thinking that I could be on Vodacom with an iPhone 3GS, enjoying all the benefits of an HSDPA network that actually works and hopefully a network operator that has a bit more of a clue about customer service – while paying a lot less per month – R249 to be exact if I go the Weekender option.

One good thing about Virgin Mobile (*gasp*) is that they don’t tie you into contracts like Vodacom or MTN.  All you have to do is pay for your handset and you’re free to go – no additional cancellation fees or penalties.

Anyway, I’ve passed the mid-point of my contract and I’ve worked out that if I were to pay off my handset using the budget facility on my credit card, I could switch my account to prepaid and just be left paying off  my handset over a much shorter period of time.

The down side is that I have about R3,000’s worth of unused airtime on my account that I would lose if I ported immediately, so I’m going to have to suffer through a few more months with Virgin Mobile just to make sure it’s not money wasted (as if any money paid to Virgin Mobile ISN’T wasted.)

But the upside is that I’m finally on the path to freedom and I’m saving money in the process.  And in a few months I’ll be able to port, get my iPhone and hopefully endure less of a nightmare.

My only concern now is if the monke…*erm* /PEOPLE/ at Virgin Mobile can process the cancellation and stop the debit orders immediately, or if I have another 6-month battle with them on the cards to get the debit order cancelled like these poor buggers.

I’ll keep you posted.

(*does small dance of joy*)…