MTN not afraid of Icasa
If you’re one of the many people affected by MTN’s billing problems, it seems unlikely that the industry regulator Icasa will be able to do much about it.
Take, for example, the case of Moneyweb Community member Andrew Diack, who got hit with a 3G bill of R27 000 between September and November last year. His average monthly bill for the previous six months was R394.
Diack’s bill for September was within the normal limits. However, he got a nasty surprise when his November bill retroactively detailed additional charges worth thousands for September.
Diack complained to MTN. After some delay, MTN’s ombudsman ruled that Diack was “completely liable” for all amounts billed. However, the ombudsman ruled that MTN should refund 50% of the total amount deducted because of MTN’s “delay in issuing correct invoices”.
Unhappy with this response, Diack complained to the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa). This is where he hit a dead end.
Sure, Icasa acknowledged Diack’s complaint, which was lodged nearly four months ago, and issued him with case number CT/G2197/09.
However, it seems that Icasa was unsuccessful in getting any response from MTN.
Icasa’s frustration can be seen in its correspondence to MTN. Letty Masilo, acting manager of Icasa’s complaints department wrote to MTN’s manager of regulatory affairs Graham de Vries:
“Subsequent to several attempts by this unit seeking to resolve the complaint lodged by AE Diack in respect to his billing complaint; we advise that this matter will now be forwarded to the Complaints Compliance Committee (CCC) for adjudication due to MTN non-response.”
Diack observes: “It would appear that Icasa are completely powerless to do anything with MTN. They completely ignore their requests.”
In further correspondence, Icasa’s Obakeng Tlhabi writes to De Vries:
“We sent this complaint to MTN on the 18th of January 2010 and it has not been responded to three months down the line. We wrote a charge sheet and right of reply regarding this matter, which were sent to yourselves on the 10th of February 2010. Today it is the 19th of March 2010 and we have still not got a courtesy of a response or even an acknowledgement from yourselves.”
Moneyweb can attest that Icasa’s frustration over MTN’s non-response is not an isolated issue. Several of our media queries regarding unhappy customers have been acknowledged, but subsequently ignored.
Meanwhile, MTN recently told Fin24 it was sorry for its billing mayhem and was hard at work rectifying the problems. Customers with unusual bills were invited to contact MTN’s call centre. But what chance do theyhave of getting an intelligent response when even the industry regulator is unsuccessful.
MTN & ICASA << comments and views
Loading ...