MTN, Vodacom or Cell C : Personal Feelings [Archive]

View Full Version : MTN, Vodacom or Cell C : Personal Feelings

Comrade Borris

03-06-2004, 04:36 PM

At the moment i've been an MTN subscriber (through MTEL) for almost 8 years, i'm getting sick of MTN customer service, or lack of it and have been thinking seriously about making the jump to another CSP. I've spoken to Cell C and they said they will give me the same number, but with an 084 prefix.

Now i've heard that Cell C is piggy backing off the Vodacom Network at the moment, and that the coverage and customer service is also not great.

Does anyone have any experience with all 3 CSPs that could provide me with an objective comparisson?

Thanks

Scandium

03-06-2004, 04:56 PM

Well, to make a long story short I was on Vodacom for two years and hadnt experienced any problems whatsoever and the coverage was excellent. I am not too sure about customer services as there was no need to ever call them.

After the above mentioned contract ended I started looking around and noticed a phone that I really wanted on contract through Cell-C, needless to say I was won over by the "l33t fact0r" of the phone and signed for the contract. To comment on signal, it is at most times non-existant, everytime I received a call I had to run outside just so that I could have a better chance at deciphering what the person on the other end was trying to say. Their services which report free minutes etc. are unreliable and at times dont even function, ever heard Steve Hawkins say "There was an error during allocation". I can assure you it isnt pleasant, it might just be me but I wouldnt recommend Cell-C to anyone. Oh yes, I wasnt impressed with the fact that one could not SMS people on other networks from the Cell-C website (like vodacom) and during my sentence there was a certain lacking of data services.

So after two years of hell with Cell-C I eventually got another contract through Nashua Mobile, the MTN procall 100 contract and I have been using it ever since. I have had to make use of customer service once for an account query and they were pleasant and helped me resolve my problem immediately. MTEL on the other hand has got a rep. for bad service, I have spoken to many unhappy individuals who have gotten contracts through them. I would say MTN's coverage is comparable to that of Vodacom and the anytime time and earning of ebucks makes it even more worth it.

In conclusion, go for MTN but through another service provider or just go straight for Vodacom and be extremely cautious when looking at Cell-C as an option.

martin

03-06-2004, 04:57 PM

I've been with both Vodacom and Cell C and in my experience Cell C has offered me much better customer service to date. I'm not sure whether they offer all the value added services that Vodacom are offering, but I just need my phone for calls and SMS's and they're fine for that.

Oh and Vodacom kept billing me two months after I terminated my contract via fax and phone calls.

ajax

03-06-2004, 05:04 PM

Hi Comrade Borris

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Now i've heard that Cell C is piggy backing off the Vodacom Network at the moment, and that the coverage and customer service is also not great.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
I can't speak too much for the customer service (although my pal at work is happy with it) but the coverage is currently a problem.
They are busy setting up their own towers (mostly 1.8 GHz), and where there are no Cell C towers available the cell phone switches over to Vodacom (local roaming). The problem is your phone will stay on Cell C until it loses the Cell C tower before switching over to Vodacom. So calls on Cell C more often break up compared to MTN or Vodacom. Also, its quite possible your phone will use more battery power than on Cell C due to this.

Cell C does have a lot of network capacity as they don't have so many subscribers yet as MTN or Vodacom. A colleague of mine on MTN says there are areas where he often gets "Network Busy" although his signal is good. But MTN and Vodacom have secretly started to use the 1.8 GHz band (I'm not sure if they acquired licenses...)
So they are working on the network congestion.

MTN and Vodacom's coverage is pretty much the same. I have simcards for all 3 networks, if I was forced to make a decision, I'd go with Vodacom (coverage wise).

Otherwise, I find Cell C's website VERY slow compared to Vodacom and MTN. Vodacom and MTN also have better websites with free stuff like ringtones. Vodacom's websms (vodacom4me) is brilliant. You can send 20 sms per day.

Costwise, I think Cell C is the cheapest, but the margin isn't big.

If you are gonna be travelling overseas and you want roaming, you might want to compare the roaming countries between the networks too.

Hope this helps.
Ajax

Comrade Borris

03-06-2004, 05:33 PM

Thanks for the info guys, Ajax with regard to roaming: Last time i travlled I told Mtel i was going overseas a week before i left and that i wanted roaming, when i arrived overseas i couldnt pick up any networks, after many reverse charge calls to memebers of my family who called them everyday they still did not connect me, they just told me that it was 'activated' and they would have it sorted 'tomorrow' (got the same story everyday) this went on for my whole trip (2 weeks).

I never did get the roaming sorted. I blame MTEL, on the otherhand my sister left the otherday, she's with Radiospoor (also MTN) she made one phonecall, it was done, and it works

kaspaas

03-06-2004, 05:41 PM

The last few days I can only get garbled conversation on my Vodacom cellphone at home.

Reported it via vodacom4me, and within an hour I had a call back.

Yes, we are aware of the problem, it is due to network overload. Our apologies, but we trust to have a new tower about 100m from the corner of ??? and ??? going in 3 weeks time.

Would you mind if a tester visits you to test the problem? We just want to be sure what the real problem is. He will contact you in about a week.

Seeing is believing!

I gather the problem is that I'm within 10km's from a fast growing squatter camp. And squatters carry cellphones nowadays as standard issue. (Standard range for GSM towers is 15km. In high density areas it can be reduced)

South Africa needs World Class Broadband at World Competitive Prices.

VQuest

03-06-2004, 06:29 PM

I've been with Vodacom for 7 years. I haven't had a moments problem. Customer support has never let me down.

I was with MTN for 2 years. Had nothing but problems from day ONE. Customer support is totally useless.

I haven't had any experience with Cell C.

Good luck.

----------------
United we stand!
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ajax

04-06-2004, 07:09 AM

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">I never did get the roaming sorted<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
Eish. Did you consider getting a local prepaid card instead? Not the ideal solution if you are a business man getting a lot of calls from everywhere but your calls will certainly be cheaper.
I'm on prepaid myself. Never liked signing contracts!

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Standard range for GSM towers is 15km. In high density areas it can be reduced)<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
You sure about that, Kaspaas? I've always known (and tested) it to be 34.5 km. I suppose its possible they can reduce the range in the cities. Granted, I tested the range in the Northern Cape near Pofadder and Aggeneys. They'd probably want max range for the towers there.

mbs

04-06-2004, 11:46 AM

Hey AJAX - can confirm what you say - have also tested in the Northern Cape (Griquastad, also north of Upington to Askham/Rietfontein) a while ago, with my readings between 30 and 40km...

kaspaas

04-06-2004, 01:43 PM

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by mbs
 Hey AJAX - can confirm what you say - have also tested in the Northern Cape (Griquastad, also north of Upington to Askham/Rietfontein) a while ago, with my readings between 30 and 40km...

<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Diameter or radius?

South Africa needs World Class Broadband at World Competitive Prices.

ajax

04-06-2004, 02:18 PM

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Diameter or radius?
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Radius, meaning direct LOS distance to the tower.

freeek

04-06-2004, 03:18 PM

just a note. Remember who has major shares in vodacom .... tel***

..- dot dot dash ;)

draco

27-09-2006, 11:04 AM

:eek: I must say that I am quite surprised at the number of happy Vodacom subscibers. I have been with Vodacom for the last decade or so and have noticed a considerable decrease in network coverage in the last few years. It seems they are so busy offering new products that the old ones (um, like talking over a cellphone) are suffering. My poor coverage is NOT phone-related - I have 3 different makes and have had software upgrades (Vodacom's panacea for all their network problems) on 2 of them. At least one day a week I get a 'network busy' signal, and at least a few times a week I drop calls or get fuzzy static. Very frustrating. I have moved to three different locations in the Pretoria and Centurion areas within the last 3 years, and my reception has not improved with any move. My data connection is also dropped on a regular basis. The only logical conclusions I can draw from these 'lapses' are that a) The network is overloaded (and letting Cell C piggy off them doesnt help Vodacom subscribers) and b) The network is, despite claims to the contrary, prioritised according to some system. And despite being on a Talk 500 contract, I am NOT prioritised. And as consumers, we just have to carry on paying for a service we don't always have access to. If Vodacom were to deduct a pro-rata amount off for every time they are unable to provide their service, why, I might pay about a quarter less every month!

I have made numerous complaints, moved up the ladder to a big-chief (dont ask me how I got his email address) and even visited HelloPeter. What I noticed on the latter is that MTN actually bothers to get back to submissions. Vodacom does not. Vodacom's 'customer care' is a complete misnomer - they are insufficiently trained and I frequently know more than they do, especially in the data care group. Since I am nowhere close to being in the field, this scares me.

After much consideration, I will be moving to MTN as soon as my contract expires with Vodacom. From first-hand experiences of many MTN contract-subscribers, I think my chances are better with them.

jontyB

27-09-2006, 11:17 AM

why oh why would you go dig up a 2 year old thread???? :eek: Surely things have changed somewhat since then?