Overcharged on OOB data

[The_Unbeliever]

One more reason to use prepaid and stick with that.

No nasty surprises, except that your airtime will be slurped up quick-quick.

 

[rorz0r]

One more reason to use prepaid and stick with that.

No nasty surprises, except that your airtime will be slurped up quick-quick.

I am on prepaid, airtime went byeeeeeeeeee (fortunately not very much of it). I checked my balance yesterday morning and data was on 0 and airtime on about R7.50 so I figured I'd have 50mb or so left but by last night it was all 0.

 

[ajax]

Hmmm looks like this happened to me too

If the 100 MB bundle activated on 27/08 was the last one you activated, then usage from 26/09 would have been outside of the 30 day expiry period of your 100 MB bundle. Then R1/MB is correct.

But you mention also "it charged from my airtime". Are you on Control Chat or Straightup? The former has inclusive airtime but the latter not.

 

[rorz0r]

If the 100 MB bundle activated on 27/08 was the last one you activated, then usage from 26/09 would have been outside of the 30 day expiry period of your 100 MB bundle. Then R1/MB is correct.

But you mention also "it charged from my airtime". Are you on Control Chat or Straightup? The former has inclusive airtime but the latter not.

Hmmm, you're right. Before this thread I didn't even realise there was a 30 day window thing. I'm on straight up prepaid. I can't tell my "my account" when my data bundle actually ended so I don't think there's a way to check this without buying one, using it up then checking when it hits 0 and experimenting after that. I've just loaded R70 airtime today and a 100mb bundle (leaving R55 airtime) and installed onavo to track it so at least now I'll kinda know when it's used up.

Interestingly, I was paying R289 on MTN and now R70 on cell c prepaid seems to last me a whole month...

 

[charlh]

*le epic bump*

Any news?

Nope- nothing yet. But they did say 24-48 working hours. So I presume that could be up to a week (9hrs/day=45hrs/week )

 

[ajax]

I'm on straight up prepaid.

Of course, forgot that on topup (Straightup) after using up all your minutes and data you buy airtime which then gets depleted at the appropriate tariff (R1/MB and minute)

 

[charlh]

Update:- Got an sms today-"Kindly be advised that we have sent the query
for further investigation as to why the data was not charged
at 0.15c and the reference for the query is 1674028 and will be
complete in 3 days."

 

[Vlad]

same story here, this could be a real money spinner for CellC if people don't notice it...

 

[rorz0r]

I haven't checked my account yet but I loaded that 100mb last week, ran out yesterday and it seemed to be depleting airtime at R1/mb for me too.

 

[Vlad]

I doubt CellC is malicious in doing this as it would create a huge PR fail if it came out, but on the other hand, it's going to be painful for them if this is a widespread issue and they have to review their income statements... It's a big difference between 0.99 and 0.15 a MB

<rant>
That said, I don't see why they have to work with this 2 tiered system, there is no logical reason for it unless to catch ppl off guard. Why is there such a things as a bundle expiry date? I switched to Cell C 2 months ago b/c of what i thought was a simple and cheap pricing structure. Nonsense like this is making me reconsider, esp since cover isn't that great either in my area.
</rant>

 

[charlh]

Well I got an SMS this morning saying "Kindly be advised that the data charges were billed on 0.15c per MB while using the bundle and the charges were correct"
I was not complaining about the in-bundle charges, I was complaining about OUT OF BUNDLE!!!

Date and Time Type Volume Amount
11/09/2012 07:46 Data 424.00 Byte 0.00
11/09/2012 07:46 Data 388.80 KB 0.38
11/09/2012 07:45 Data 54.68 KB 0.06
11/09/2012 07:45 Data 598.00 Byte 0.00
11/09/2012 07:40 Data 481.00 Byte 0.00
11/09/2012 07:40 Data 31.83 KB 0.04
10/09/2012 19:55 Data 128.00 Byte 0.00
10/09/2012 19:55 Data 95.45 KB 0.10
10/09/2012 18:12 Data 1.10 MB 1.09
10/09/2012 18:07 Data 690.66 KB 0.68

Explain these charges then. Note that I loaded a 50MB bundle on 01/09/2012. The bundle was depleted on 08/09/2012.

 

[sajunky]

This is kind of hiding the head in sand approach, surely they know what your complain was for. It looks like designer of this offer should be fired, the first real challenge and test for AKC. Clearly they didn't assess their billing system correctly before going ahead with this offer.
I wrote in my earlier post (when offer was introduced) that the next logical step for simplicity would be no bundles, but flat 15c/MB rate. Now is probably a way to deal with current situation. You can't change billing system in a week or so.
Vodacom would change T&C in similiar case, it happened in the past.

 

[charlh]

This is kind of hiding the head in sand approach, surely they know what your complain was for.

It's that kind of response from them that really pi***s me off. It seems as if no-one reads the message to the end. They look at the first five words of the sentence, and make a decision according to that. The data price was the main reason I ported to cell c in the first place.

 

[Vlad]

I also still have to hear back from them after my complaint yesterday...
the 0.15 c OOB rate is still being advertised so they should honour it.
if they don't sort this out within the next few days, i'll be moving onto MTN...

i also wonder if this is a few isolated events or a standard thing policy? if the latter, surely it's worth raising this more publicly

 

[torgo]

Come on Cellc, respond. All your hard effort to win customer loyalty will start fading!!!

 

[charlh]

Come on Cellc, respond. All your hard effort to win customer loyalty will start fading!!!

I sent Cell C customer care an email and pm'd CellC again yesterday regarding this. On Monday I will go to HelloPeter if I don't get any response. Maybe they can help me to get a sensible response.

 

[CellBel]

Well sorry, i'll have to contact ASA/CPA about this stealing of my airtime. I was charged R9 for 4.81 Mb just now. Since i logged onto the web this morning my airtime dropped from R79 to R20. I cannot stay at cellc any longer @ R2 per meg and no refunds for their mistakes. So CellC it seems to me you cannot survive without stealing.

 

[Vlad]

they are shockingly quiet in their response to inquiries about this... apart from a "i've forwarded this to our technical team" i've heard nothing, and in the meantime my last R20 of airtime disappeared during the night.
i won't be recharging until a refund and if they refuse, i'm moving back to VC... not at all impressed in my 2 months with cellc

 

[CellBel]

they are shockingly quiet in their response to inquiries about this... apart from a "i've forwarded this to our technical team" i've heard nothing, and in the meantime my last R20 of airtime disappeared during the night.
i won't be recharging until a refund and if they refuse, i'm moving back to VC... not at all impressed in my 2 months with cellc

Very smart coders on their payroll?

 

[Christiaan]

A week now and no reply. 3 pm's sent to Cell C here on MyBB and 2 messages sent to Cell C via their website.

Wonder if I should bother with the call center... I will not stop though, I want my R32+ (according to the incomplete "usage history") back, because of the wrongly charged OOB rate. I'm sure they can see exactly what the amount is.