WebAfrica...

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lukekay

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Not sure if anyone else has noticed this but, while I was reviewing our current household costs and looking for ways to cut our monthly spend I logged into the WA portal to see what options I had in terms of downgrading our internet and to my surprise the below stood out quite blatantly.
1669187967752.png

I've since queried this via their support system and the agent confirmed that it is a new package however, there is a catch. If I change over to the new package in order to pay less I am liable for a R999 cancellation fee. If I downgrade to ANY of the above listed packages I too am also liable for a R999 cancellation fee as they've since removed the old package options that do NOT include their little 'fine' for choosing another ISP.
1669189169226.png

I've had no issues with WA and their support has never been anything short of great in that time (I know there are quite a few on here that would argue otherwise), I have been with them for almost 5 years with not a single complaint. This on the other hand feels rather scammy/shady behavior and quite frankly utterly disappointing.

I am now stuck between a rock and hard place, cancel and move ISP's to save money or take the 'slap on the wrists' for choosing to downgrade/remain on the same package for less. If I didn't work from home the move would be easy but, I currently can't afford to not have internet and judging by the countless threads on these forums moving ISP is no quick task with all the delays/issues/ransoms...

But anyways, fingers burnt and lessons learnt - this is more an FYI for those who may find themselves in the same position.
 
A question to the community, what is the best way to cancel/transfer to another ISP and avoid delays/fights over the vuma infrastructure?

I do have OpenServe available which may be an alternative option (price depending) to avoid ISP politics/shenanigans.
 
Highly recommend going with OpenServe. I would never choose Vumatel if I had an option.

Vumatel makes transferring to another ISP take longer and the process is way more painful.

Vumatel is much less reliable, has frequent downtime and terrible support. Lost count of how many times my Vumatel line has been down in the last 2 years. Currently on day 3 of my fibre being dead, and I'll be lucky if it's fixed by next week.

Vumatel locks you into a single ISP so you can't use an alternative when your ISP has downtime.

Vumatel imposes annoying limitations.

Vumatel forces your ISP to charge you a R575+ downgrade fee when you want to downgrade your line speed, so upgrading temporarily is not an option, and good luck if you upgraded before Vumatel surprised you with a "free upgrade".

None of these things are an issue on OpenServe.
 
This is what I got when I checked although no fiber is available in my area but according to them fiber is ready to install.
Installation fee wow...
 

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lukekay said:
Not sure if anyone else has noticed this but, while I was reviewing our current household costs and looking for ways to cut our monthly spend I logged into the WA portal to see what options I had in terms of downgrading our internet and to my surprise the below stood out quite blatantly.
View attachment 1427419

I've since queried this via their support system and the agent confirmed that it is a new package however, there is a catch. If I change over to the new package in order to pay less I am liable for a R999 cancellation fee. If I downgrade to ANY of the above listed packages I too am also liable for a R999 cancellation fee as they've since removed the old package options that do NOT include their little 'fine' for choosing another ISP.
Click to expand...
Whoever you were talking to, is lying. There is no cancellation fee to downgrade.
Get in contact with someone else at WA and report the guy who told you this, and ask them to downgrade you.

Them also charging you the higher price is also ridiculous. Not sure what's going on there.
 
xtm said:
This is what I got when I checked although no fiber is available in my area but according to them fiber is ready to install.
Installation fee wow...
Click to expand...
Your area is in the pre-order phase as it's shown on that page, so you'll have to wait a bit before it's ready to install. (There's no mention on the page that it's ready to install)

The installation fee is a common thing. With some ISPs, you can have the waive the installation fee if you stay with them for 6-24 months (depending on the ISP).
 
Vorastra said:
Whoever you were talking to, is lying. There is no cancellation fee to downgrade.
Get in contact with someone else at WA and report the guy who told you this, and ask them to downgrade you.

Them also charging you the higher price is also ridiculous. Not sure what's going on there.
Click to expand...
You are correct, I may not have been clear in how I explained the cancellation fee. They will not charge me to downgrade (while staying with WA) but, because I will be downgrading to their 'new' package structure it means that when I want to cancel (for whatever reason in the future) I will now be liable for that cancellation fee being imposed. Really crappy behavior, if that fee was present when I signed up 4ish years ago I would have promptly taken my money elsewhere.

So I am now stuck having to move ISP's in order to downgrade and avoid the imposed fee (which I did not sign up for) instead of remaining a customer of theirs.
 
lukekay said:
You are correct, I may not have been clear in how I explained the cancellation fee. They will not charge me to downgrade (while staying with WA) but, because I will be downgrading to their 'new' package structure it means that when I want to cancel (for whatever reason in the future) I will now be liable for that cancellation fee being imposed. Really crappy behavior, if that fee was present when I signed up 4ish years ago I would have promptly taken my money elsewhere.

So I am now stuck having to move ISP's in order to downgrade and avoid the imposed fee (which I did not sign up for) instead of remaining a customer of theirs.
Click to expand...
Ah right. But then even that sounds wrong, but then I went to go read the ToS.

The reason I thought it sounded weird is that I'm with MetroFibre as my fibre line. You only pay the cancellation fee if you leave within the first 12 months.
But it seems that there's a specific rule for Vuma customers. Vuma customers have to pay R999 no matter what when they cancel, no matter how long you've been with WebAfrica.

That's pretty shtty, ngl.
 
Is there a Webafrica Representative on this forum. Been with them since 2007, but the service I have received the past 4 days is shocking.

You only have one option for support, but their WhatsApp (well at least my messaging with them) gives no response back. If I call Sales and BEG them to get technical support to call me, I get a notification on WhatsApp. So since the 25th my request for a line upgrade is pending and my support ticket is simply not being answered (although status says pending).

This is really an absolute joke that you cannot call and speak to a person. Can anyone assist with an alternate number to their support desk, or perhaps a representative on this forum.

Regards

1669666771285.png
 
lukekay said:
Not sure if anyone else has noticed this but, while I was reviewing our current household costs and looking for ways to cut our monthly spend I logged into the WA portal to see what options I had in terms of downgrading our internet and to my surprise the below stood out quite blatantly.
View attachment 1427419

I've since queried this via their support system and the agent confirmed that it is a new package however, there is a catch. If I change over to the new package in order to pay less I am liable for a R999 cancellation fee. If I downgrade to ANY of the above listed packages I too am also liable for a R999 cancellation fee as they've since removed the old package options that do NOT include their little 'fine' for choosing another ISP.
View attachment 1427425

I've had no issues with WA and their support has never been anything short of great in that time (I know there are quite a few on here that would argue otherwise), I have been with them for almost 5 years with not a single complaint. This on the other hand feels rather scammy/shady behavior and quite frankly utterly disappointing.

I am now stuck between a rock and hard place, cancel and move ISP's to save money or take the 'slap on the wrists' for choosing to downgrade/remain on the same package for less. If I didn't work from home the move would be easy but, I currently can't afford to not have internet and judging by the countless threads on these forums moving ISP is no quick task with all the delays/issues/ransoms...

But anyways, fingers burnt and lessons learnt - this is more an FYI for those who may find themselves in the same position.
Click to expand...
Hi there Luke, i see this post is nearly a year old. However we had the same issue with webafrica and the account payer (my mom) was told that you need to tell them you found a package for cheaper (if i’m not mistaken) and then they’ll offer you the same package at the lower price shown. seems very shady as to why they’ll do that, but i hope this helps
 
I was under the impression that Webafrica introduced the cancellation fee for all new customers earlier this year, but maybe they actually started doing this before that. What they're doing feels scammy and shady, because it is. There is no reason for them not to simply lower the price for customers who have been with them for five or ten years to the same price they are charging new customers. They don't need a cancellation fee to disincentivise such long-time customers from leaving.

kyle0505 said:
Hi there Luke, i see this post is nearly a year old. However we had the same issue with webafrica and the account payer (my mom) was told that you need to tell them you found a package for cheaper (if i’m not mistaken) and then they’ll offer you the same package at the lower price shown. seems very shady as to why they’ll do that, but i hope this helps
Click to expand...
My experience was that they simply pointed to the cheaper package options already on the site that you can get by agreeing to the new terms which include a perpetual R999 cancellation fee. They had no interest whatsoever in retaining a pre-existing customer by simply lowering the price for them. They even made some nonsensical claim that they'd be running at a loss if they simply gave an existing customer the lower price.
 
WebAfrica was literally the worst provider I have ever used. Move to any other provider, do not continue to do business with them as they will shaft you at every possible opportunity and if you connection does start developing issues they will only waste your time and not fix the issue.
 
WebAfrica seems to be using a partner in Durban the last two days or so.

On the MyBB speedtest and the test-ipv6.com site, it used to come up with the correct name of "Web-Africa-Networks-AS" but now on MyBB it's "Optinet" and on test-ipv6 it's "Internet-Solutions".

Weird. Also no IPv6.
 
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