Telkom, just have to vent...

[Arzy]

This post is purely a vent, dealing with Telkom is the 8th level of hell...

I purchased a new house and took occupation on the 1st of September, the previous owner of the house was rather accomodating and the 2 of us toddle off to the nearest Telkom shop in order to do a line tranfer of the existing telephone and ADSL from him to myself during August.

Come 1 September I start work on renovating the house and decide that I may as well see if everything is in working order, plug my modem in ADSL syncs and for the course of the month everything is perfect. Debit order goes off as requested, no charges from the previous owner on my bill and it has all my correct details on the account.

Come 2 October and I actually move into the house, start unpacking, sit down eventually and want to go onto the net...nothing...ADSL is still synched but I can't connect to my ISP.

Call my ISP: nothing from their side.
Call Telkom: technician will come out and actually does on a sunday, can't find a fault though, try calling again
Call Telkom: nothing
Call Telkom again: Speak to someone else who actually checks my account, the line has been suspended and I need to speak to the accounts department on Monday


Call Telkom on Monday: Yes the ADSL portion of my account was suspended for non-payment, but they can see that it was paid so this is a mistake, will send an email to rectify.
Get home on Monday: ADSL isn't even syncing, call Telkom, must be a fault on the line and they will send out a technician
Tuesday: Nothing, keep calling, someone will come
Wednesday: By 5pm, still nothing, keep calling

Call 6 to Telkom on Wednesday I am informed that my ADSL service has been cancelled as requested and...proudly...that is why the line isn't working.

OH? I'd love to who cancelled my line on my behalf but they can't see that unfortunately...to fix this I need to call new services and order ADSL again...

Call 10219, someone finally picks up, listens to my story and transfers me back to the options menu where I am now informed that it is after hours nobody can help me...

Call again this morning, have an order number, activation for my new order will take 7 to 14 days...


So I have gone from a completely working ADSL line for the month when I wasn't staying in my house yet, to a suspended line the day I moved in, to my line being cancelled and now having had to order a new line again and nobody at Telkom can tell me why or how long this is now going to take.

I would say this is worst level of service that I have ever experienced but I can't, the simple reason for that is that Telkom took 2 years to actually install ADSL at my previous house in the first place....

 

[Ry4n]

Yeap that sounds normal for Telkom - they're the pits to deal with.
Even if you know what the problem is they will still take you through a month long process to resolve a small problem that could be resolved in minutes.
God knows why!?!

 

[tortured]

I feel for you....honestly I do.

Couple of months ago our adsl go down at work. Call telkom only to be told it has been cancelled as requested. I ask them who did it, they could not say other than the request was faxed with company letterhead and all.

They said they would send us a copy of the fax, still waiting......

 

[gregmcc]

Funny story...lol..sorry Can't believe telkoms incompetence. I wish with just a phone call I could cancel their CEO's home phone line. How can they have no record of who cancelled the line? :wtf:

 

[Icarium]

Any bets that Telkom was billing both you and the previous owner for the same line? Previous owner gets billed, doesn't pay, your line gets suspended. Previous owner tries to sort it out by cancelling his account, your line gets cancelled right along with it.

 

[Arzy]

I don't even think they know what they were doing.

In short I actually can expect a lot of this from Telkom, what really irks me is as follows:

The line worked perfectly for a month;
They actually sent out a technician to the house;
It took in excess of 6 calls for some to realise the line was cancelled;
Now I have to wait for the service to be reactivated...

They can stop the damned thing over night but they can't get it working again without placing a new order and waiting...

 

[millennia]

What til they get back to you and say there's no ports available at the exchange

 

[bin3]

Only advice I can give is never to transfer a line from a previous owner.

It never works well -- might just be too complicated for them.

Get the previous owner to stop their account; apply for a new one.

I have always done this, and have never had an issue before. I have many friends who tried the transfer route ... and well yes: your story is not unique.

Good luck though !

 

[VioAdmin]

Simply pathetic and disgusting service from Telkom!