Have a dispute with Vodafone? TDRS is your friend

Forums › One NZ (including Farmside) › Have a dispute with Vodafone? TDRS is your friend

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#152656 30-Jul-2008 11:31

Damian, I don't think that's entirely true. If you like I can look at your history and see what's gone on and try to sort something out, but I doubt we've ignored your communications.

What's the issue?

Cheers

Paul

Paul Brislen
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http://forum.vodafone.co.nz

NZtechfreak

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#152657 30-Jul-2008 11:32

Well its no secret that I'm not a great fan of the telcos, but its important to give credit where its due - this is one of those instances. Search for "complaint" and you get the information straight up seems good to me, and this is a nice initiative to boot. Well done Vodafone.

To the OP: It seems you are very out of step with the other users here going on the reaction to this thread. Most here are very reasonable people, perhaps its time to take stock of your position in light of this?

I mean, if you can't even get me to whinge alongside you on a telecommunications issue then it seems to me there isn't much to whinge about... ;]

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#152659 30-Jul-2008 11:45

damianf, what is the problem that you are facing with vodafone? perhaps Paul, Johnr or one of the other geekzone members can help you with.

Do whatever you want to do man.

damianf

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#152660 30-Jul-2008 11:57

Paul/Bill/TechFreak,

My motivation for posting was neither to gather support for my cause nor to seek help with a resolution. Thanks for the offers of support and advice, but all I want to do is bring the TDRS to the attention of readers of the forum. This service was long overdue and I don't think that nearly enough people know about it.

Nuff said - happy posting.

freitasm

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#152661 30-Jul-2008 12:01

PaulBrislen: Damian, I don't think that's entirely true. If you like I can look at your history and see what's gone on and try to sort something out, but I doubt we've ignored your communications.

What's the issue?

Cheers

Paul

I think damianf has explained the reason for posting - to let people know about a service that it is there to protect people's interests when facing the big companies.

On a side note Paul, Vodafone has an appaling record of answering questions via e-mail. I had myself many e-mails gone unanswered over the years. And I have to say I rather use e-mail than call anyone.

But I think this is for some other discussion.

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#152663 30-Jul-2008 12:04

freitasm:
PaulBrislen: Damian, I don't think that's entirely true. If you like I can look at your history and see what's gone on and try to sort something out, but I doubt we've ignored your communications.

What's the issue?

Cheers

Paul

I think damianf has explained the reason for posting - to let people know about a service that it is there to protect people's interests when facing the big companies.

On a side note Paul, Vodafone has an appaling record of answering questions via e-mail. I had myself many e-mails gone unanswered over the years. And I have to say I rather use e-mail than call anyone.

But I think this is for some other discussion.

Mauricio, you're well off topic and flaming to boot. I call on the Moderators to Ban You.

oh, wait...

Paul Brislen
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Vodafone

http://forum.vodafone.co.nz

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#152675 30-Jul-2008 13:02

I have never heard of them, and appreciate you pointing them out!!

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#152784 30-Jul-2008 20:02

cranz:
(for comparison reasons, searching complaint on telecom.co.nz gives you a less than satisfactory response, whereas telstraclear.co.nz has similar page of information to vodafone)

You can find the dispute information by going to 'Contact us' and 'Make a complaint'.

It has similar information to what the other providers have.

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JoeBloggs

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#152837 30-Jul-2008 22:15

I work for Vodafone and didn't know this existed. Right from when I began with the company, no mention of this was put forth in any training or any memos. However I've never been in a position to complain directly, if I had, typing in "complaint" on the Vodafone website seems rather easy to do so I don't see Vodafone as trying to hide the service.

damianf

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#152868 31-Jul-2008 04:31

Hi Joe, I don't want to offend you or Paul or anyone else who works for Vodafone who's on the 'zone, but I believe your employer has an entire business model that revolves around misleading and confusing customers. Before I go into the reasons why I believe this, I do want to point out that I don't think Vodafone are unique in this respect - if I thought Telecom was any better I would have switched to them years ago.

Here are some of the experiences I have had with Vodafone over the years:

- When I first signed the Vodafone store representative told me that they would have a credit check done on me and have me connected within a few hours (which was critical, as I had job interviews at the time). In the end it took almost a week due to a backlog at the Vodafone department that does credit checks. When I rang to complain I was told that this department had a constant backlog (i.e. had done so for months) and that all the Vodafone stores knew about it, but that they kept telling people that new connections would be done within hours in order to not drive away business. I complained to the Commerce Commission at the time and they told me that they had several similar complaints, but not enough evidence of false or misleading advertising to prosecute (apparently very difficult to make a complaint stick regarding verbal representations).

- I have spoken to the Vodafone '777' help desk and have had issues that they have had to escalate to level 2 support. When I've asked if it is possible to be put through to this second level help desk I have been told, on several occaisions, that this is not possible either because they don't have phones (?!?) or because the first level help desk does not have their number. Pose as a customer and try this out - it is quite entertaining. When I challenge the first level bods (no fool is going to believe that they are unable to contact their own second level help desk, after all) I usually get a sheepish 'yeah, that is a lie, but we are instructed to tell customers this' (or something to that effect). I once had a friendly Scottish guy who insisted that it was a sacakable offence for him to put me through to their second level support (in the end he got up and walked over to them to grovel for attention for my problem rather than risk the wrath of Vodafone for transferring me through).

- Recently I made a complaint to Vodafone over the phone and was put through to an 'escalations manager'. When I rang back later to follow up on this issue I was told that they were unable to transfer calls outside of the help desk (kind of strange for a telco, no?) Funnily enough when I challenged the (very friendly) person that told me this she cheerfully admitted that they can transfer calls out of the call centre, but that they weren't allowed to and that they could be sacked for doing so.

- Number portability - almost no-one in the civillian population (i.e. outside of us geeks) knows that this exists - I read one recent study that put the knowledgeable percentage of the population at below 10%. Ok, I know it's not Vodafone's job to inform customers about number portability, but wouldnt you think that if Vodafone (or Telecom for that matter) was actually proud of their service (and confident in their ability to retain customers) then they would advertise number portability like there was no tomorrow? Before anyone posts to tell me a search for 'number portabilty' on Voda's site returns hits, I know this, but that is beside the point - I'd rather know how the competition between our two cell phone companies got so stagnant.

- Complaints - despite what Paul says below, I have found that Vodafone will quite happily ignore complaints made by phone or email. I only managed to get any meaningful response from Vodafone to a recent complaint after complaining to the TDRS. This is a real problem, as Vodafone's front line service can be pretty shocking.

- TDRS - scheme members (including Voda) have committed to promoting this independent service (not just making a single reference to it on their web site). I have yet to see a single advertisement or brochure for it from any telco. Kind of makes you wonder why our largest telcos have signed up to the scheme but refuse to fufil their committments to promote it, no?

- BlackBerry advertising - my recent complaint with Vodafone related to being told I could use any standard data plan with my BlackBerry (or no data plan at all if I wanted 'a la carte' data), only to find out later that it would cost me $495 per month to download 1GB of data to my BlackBerry (v.s. the $59.95 per month that same 1GB would have cost me with my old Nokia). I have spoken to over two dozen first line Vodafone representatives (stores and call centres) and every single one of them has told me that I could use a standard GPRS plan with my Blackberry (they even signed me up to a genric plan at one point). I've since found out that this is untrue and that Vodafone blocks Internet access to BlackBerry users unless you sign up to a BlackBerry plan that will cost you 825% more for that gig. Try ringing a store and check this for yourself - I'm pretty sure you will get the same answer that I have. If this is not false and misleading conduct then I don't know what is?

- While pursuing my complaint about BlackBerry issues I've been fed a juicy selection of lies and mistruths by Voda representatives. This post is already getting too long so I won't list them here, but if anyone is interested I'll post some of the correspondence when my TDRS complaint has reached a conclusion. Some of it would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

I appreciate the fact that this post may generate a number of 'angry guy get back in your box' flames, but I believe it is important for us to discuss and debate the service that we get from our telcos and to inform each other of independent services like the TDRS.

Like it or not, our mobiles have become an integral and important part of our lives, meaning that we have come to rely on our two mobile operators heavily. It is no longer an option for any of us to choose to be mobile free.

Vodafone and Telecom have an obligation to deal with their customers in a fair and open manner and to actually compete with each other in order to benefit the customer. I believe that Vodafone falls well short in meeting each of these obligations and feel strongly that we deserve a lot better. I certainly believe that Vodafone lacks integrity in dealing with customers and this shouldn't be acceptable.

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#152903 31-Jul-2008 09:50

JoeBloggs: I work for Vodafone and didn't know this existed. Right from when I began with the company, no mention of this was put forth in any training or any memos. However I've never been in a position to complain directly, if I had, typing in "complaint" on the Vodafone website seems rather easy to do so I don't see Vodafone as trying to hide the service.

I work for Vodafone NZ and went to a 1 hour training session and also another follow-up session about 2 weeks later.

A Brochure out lining the service was placed on my desk one morning and also the desks around me.

Training was held prior to the compliance date which was the 30/11/2007

I have also seen many ALL staff emails regarding the correct process about the service

I have also checked our intranet and can say there is alot of information on there about the service.

Just my 2 cents worth!

John

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#152907 31-Jul-2008 09:57

johnr: A Brochure?out lining?the service was placed on my desk one morning and also the desks around me

I also saw these brochures in a stand at Harvey Norman in Wellington so the claim that these have not been publically distributed is inaccurate.

JoeBloggs

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#152912 31-Jul-2008 10:15

I suppose different departments, different memos, john

. I'm not in a position to deal with complaints directly though you obviously are. I took the liberty of calling a few people from DM and FM once I read that to find out if they'd had the same training (on the ground floor so to speak), and all of them stated no. Though one of them stated their store received a brochure drop around a year ago and had since received nothing. It seems odd to train only your department (though you must be in a good position to help people), and not the people who are on the front line. Apparently there's not even a memo on their VFHub as to the procedure.

I'm not saying they should advertise the service in big bold letters either. This one's a grey area and I don't really think they've done anything wrong.

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#152918 31-Jul-2008 10:33

JoeBloggs: I suppose different departments, different memos, john . I'm not in a position to deal with complaints directly though you obviously are.

Not me neither!

I don't work on the front line or complaints

What do you do?

damianf

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#152923 31-Jul-2008 10:44

johnr: I work for Vodafone NZ and went to a 1 hour training session and also another follow-up session about 2 weeks later.

Johnr you really should state your afiliation before flaming in defence of your employer. You have every right to, of course, but it is courteous to be up front about your bias.

D.

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