No compensation for roaming issues over Xmas/NY

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Benjip

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#19264 11-Feb-2008 15:36

Well I'm thoroughly pissed off - just got off the phone for the 4th time since last Tuesday trying to get hold of someone at Vodafone about roaming charges on my account for Xmas/New Years. The situation is that I needed to use my Vodafone cellphone in Australia when VF Aus was down, so I used the only network I could - Yes! Optus.

That was all good and well until my bill came through about a week ago - which includes a $50 charge for a 6 minute phonecall or something exorbitant like that. All up, the roaming charges were about $65 more than they should've been (Vodafone Australia charges $1.50 per minute for calls back to NZ; Optus' rate is $6.50). So I was effectively paying 6.5 times more than I should've been just to make a couple of important phonecalls.

Anyway, I finally got hold of someone at a Vodafone call centre (when did they start outsourcing overseas?) and after the CSR arguing with me for over 40 minutes, she tells me that there'll be no compensation on my bill.

I'm absolutely fuming over this - yes it's only $65 extra on top of my normal bill, but it's the principle that pisses me off. Any decent company would own up to their mistakes and take affirmative action to do something about the charges before they're even billed. Apparently Vodafone doesn't care much for a loyal On Account customer of 7 years.

What I need to know is, is there any next step I can take? The CSR informed me that there was nobody higher than her available as she was a 'Team Leader', but I'm not sold. Surely there's someone higher up the chain I can speak with? So much for a 'case by case' basis when assessing the roaming 'incident', this girl didn't want a bar of it.

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#109906 11-Feb-2008 16:23

that sucks big time. Lucky for me I had my Telecom phone as well as a Vodafone Aus simcard, so it didn't affect me once I knew that I hadn't done something to break my phone.

Hopefully someone from Vodafone will look into this one, cos it sounds like you have a good case IMO.

old3eyes

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#109918 11-Feb-2008 16:42

I was over in Ozz the other week and had to buy a new fone from Vodafone as my old Motorola would not roam. Bought a LG for $A69. Put in my NZ vodafone SIM and it would not work. Took it back to Vodafone and they lock the fones and had to pay another $A72 to get it unlocked so my NZ SIM would work. You would think that a locked Vodafone unit would work with any other Vodafone SIM in the world wouldn't you?? I could understand if it was a TCNZ or another carrier in Ozz..

Regards,

Old3eyes

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#109922 11-Feb-2008 16:48

old3eyes: I was over in Ozz the other week and had to buy a new fone from Vodafone as my old Motorola would not roam. Bought a LG for $A69. Put in my NZ vodafone SIM and it would not work. Took it back to Vodafone and they lock the fones and had to pay another $A72 to get it unlocked so my NZ SIM would work. You would think that a locked Vodafone unit would work with any other Vodafone SIM in the world wouldn't you?? I could understand if it was a TCNZ or another carrier in Ozz..

Roaming is network and some phone (working freq) if your Motorola is 900mhz GSM it can roam in OZ, If it was not 900mhz GSM it would not work in New Zealand.

Devices are locked by Vodafone AU to VFAU SIMs as the handset sub is paid for by Vodafone AU not Vodafone NZ

tonyhughes

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#109923 11-Feb-2008 17:06

Benjip: Well I'm thoroughly pissed off - just got off the phone for the 4th time since last Tuesday trying to get hold of someone at Vodafone about roaming charges on my account for Xmas/New Years. The situation is that I needed to use my Vodafone cellphone in Australia when VF Aus was down, so I used the only network I could - Yes! Optus.

That was all good and well until my bill came through about a week ago - which includes a $50 charge for a 6 minute phonecall or something exorbitant like that. All up, the roaming charges were about $65 more than they should've been (Vodafone Australia charges $1.50 per minute for calls back to NZ; Optus' rate is $6.50). So I was effectively paying 6.5 times more than I should've been just to make a couple of important phonecalls.

Anyway, I finally got hold of someone at a Vodafone call centre (when did they start outsourcing overseas?) and after the CSR arguing with me for over 40 minutes, she tells me that there'll be no compensation on my bill.

I'm absolutely fuming over this - yes it's only $65 extra on top of my normal bill, but it's the principle that pisses me off. Any decent company would own up to their mistakes and take affirmative action to do something about the charges before they're even billed. Apparently Vodafone doesn't care much for a loyal On Account customer of 7 years.

What I need to know is, is there any next step I can take? The CSR informed me that there was nobody higher than her available as she was a 'Team Leader', but I'm not sold. Surely there's someone higher up the chain I can speak with? So much for a 'case by case' basis when assessing the roaming 'incident', this girl didn't want a bar of it.

I have read this several times, and I simply do not see how this is Vodafones problem. Could you enlighten us as to why Vodafone should give you some free money?

Benjip

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#109925 11-Feb-2008 17:14

tonyhughes:
I have read this several times, and I simply do not see how this is Vodafones problem. Could you enlighten us as to why Vodafone should give you some free money?

Wow, bitter much?

The issue is that Vodafone sells a service - part of which is easy roaming, especially in Australia. If their network is down for the 8 days I'm in Aussie for, I damn well expect to be able to use an alternate network and not be charged a horrendous rate to do so.

It's the same concept as a courtesy car - your Audi breaks down so your dealer fixes you up with a suitable alternative at no charge while they rectify the problem. It's none of your doing that the car has broken down, just like it was not my doing that Vodafone Australia network (a sister network of Vodafone NZ) couldn't handle a 'massive influx' of traffic.

I mean come on, it's not like I sat on my phone TXTing and calling all day, raking up hundreds of dollars and then wanting it back. I just want to be compensated for the two semi-long calls I did make: calls I was not able to make on the Vodafone Australia network.

tonyhughes

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#109929 11-Feb-2008 17:23

Not bitter at all, just asking.

It sounds like the service you wanted was unavailable, so you just used a competitors network, not realising what the charges were.

I am sure your Ts & Cs don't guarantee service, or compensation to you for using a competitors network at a higher cost.

You seemed to be aware at the time, of the fact that the network owned by your carrier was not available, and the network you were choosing to use was someone elses.

Unless you have a contract with Vodafone to cover this circumstance (Roaming unavailable), I just don't see why they should give you money.

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Benjip

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#109935 11-Feb-2008 17:36

Guarantees and T&C's aside, it's still a pretty shoddy thing for a big business to do - fail to provide a service to thousands of customers and then do absolutely nothing about the repercussions.

I seem to recall that those affected by the Xtra Yahoo! Bubble were given compensation when they had a service outage for a week or so. So why is Vodafone not keen to help out its customers in that manner?

Needless to say, this has completely rattled the faith I had in Vodafone as a helpful, friendly company, and I'll definitely be considering alternatives as soon as there's another GSM option available in NZ.

sbiddle

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#109938 11-Feb-2008 17:40

I asked this exact question (would people be compensated for using other networks while roaming) on the original VF roaming thread and Paul said it would be reviewed on a case by case basis. It seems only reasonable that Vodafone should be reviewing these charges. I don't believe there should be compensation simply because the service didn't go but I believe it's only reasonable that customers be refunded the difference so they would pay the VF network rate when they had to roam on another network.

tonyhughes

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#109939 11-Feb-2008 17:45

The bubble thing was more than a week, and wasn't just an outage, but a veritable montage of poor service that culminated in some of the worst email service I have heard about (although I made the switch, and it was 100% fine for me, bar a few extra bits of spam).

Sucks that you had to pay higher costs, but it looks like we may agree to differ on opinion of who should pay. Good luck if you do pursue a refund.

freitasm

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#109941 11-Feb-2008 17:48

Specially when the users did not have any alternative for eight to ten days. One thing is a roaming fault, another thing is a long roaming fault.

The impression I have is the CSRs don't even know something happened and are just firewalling...

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PenultimateHop

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#109942 11-Feb-2008 17:50

tonyhughes: The bubble thing was more than a week, and wasn't just an outage, but a veritable montage of poor service that culminated in some of the worst email service I have heard about (although I made the switch, and it was 100% fine for me, bar a few extra bits of spam).

You could take exactly the same sentence, replace "bubble" with "roaming", "email" with "phone", and remove the spam bit and you have exactly the same scenario.

Very poor effort by Vodafone, and I am unimpressed to hear that they are not even making an attempt at being decent about this. I am very glad that my roaming business is on another carrier, or I'd be beyond furious.

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nzbnw

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#109958 11-Feb-2008 18:33

tonyhughes:
I have read this several times, and I simply do not see how this is Vodafones problem. Could you enlighten us as to why Vodafone should give you some free money?

Or perhaps the OP could have signed up to traveller, and then this would have been a non event.

Did Vodafone give you this option at any point either before your trip, or during your trip?

nzbnw

Benjip

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#109961 11-Feb-2008 18:54

nzbnw:

Or perhaps the OP could have signed up to traveller, and then this would have been a non event.

Did Vodafone give you this option at any point either before your trip, or during your trip?

nzbnw

I was never told about Traveller until I saw some Point of Sale advertising in Auckland Airport on my return to NZ.

To the person who suggested Vodafone refund the difference between $1.50 per minute and $6.50 per minute - that is exactly what I'm after. Obviously I'm happy to pay the roaming per-minute rate but not the rate of another network when it's the only alternative (as freitasm pointed out).

allstarnz

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#109975 11-Feb-2008 20:11

old3eyes: I was over in Ozz the other week and had to buy a new fone from Vodafone as my old Motorola would not roam. Bought a LG for $A69. Put in my NZ vodafone SIM and it would not work. Took it back to Vodafone and they lock the fones and had to pay another $A72 to get it unlocked so my NZ SIM would work. You would think that a locked Vodafone unit would work with any other Vodafone SIM in the world wouldn't you?? I could understand if it was a TCNZ or another carrier in Ozz..

Yeah, if you read all the brochures it's standard practice for all operators to SIM lock their phones so that you can't switch providers easily. Virgin, Telstra, Vodafone and Optus all do it. In saying that, some phones aren't SIM locked. The phone doesn't care what SIM you put in there, if it's not one from the company you got the phone from, you're out of luck.

The Vodafone guy comes onto this thread to comment on something trivial but doesn't respond to the actual point of the thread, what gives?

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#109976 11-Feb-2008 20:26

I'm a bit divided when it comes to this issue:
* On one hand, you have terms and conditions which clearly state that they can't provide a fault-less service.
* On the other, it was a prolonged outage and caused a lot of expense.

I think that it should be reviewed on a case by case basis, particularly in instances where people have had to resort to more expensive medians (such as being forced to roam on other providers). I found the attempts to shift the blame off to Optus were a bit excessive, particularly when it was finally admitted that it was a forecasting issue. All it would have taken was one statement.

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