{"id":131546,"date":"2015-07-08T15:32:02","date_gmt":"2015-07-08T13:32:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=131546"},"modified":"2015-07-08T15:34:28","modified_gmt":"2015-07-08T13:34:28","slug":"cellphone-contract-cancellation-what-you-will-pay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/cellular\/131546-cellphone-contract-cancellation-what-you-will-pay.html","title":{"rendered":"Cellphone contract cancellation: what you will pay"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cell C recently\u00a0stated\u00a0that its competitors are trying to stop subscribers from cancelling their contracts and moving to Cell C, by charging \u201cexcessive and unreasonable cancellation penalties.\u201d<\/p>\n

The network\u2019s objections came a few weeks after it launched its Contract Buy-out promotion, offering up to R10,000 to anyone who wanted to cancel their contract with another network and switch to Cell C.<\/p>\n

While the Consumer Protection Act lets service providers charge a \u201creasonable cancellation penalty\u201d, Cell C argued that such a fee should only be used to recover the cost of the handset included in a contract.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnreasonable charges for future services that the customer will never receive is in contravention of the CPA,\u201d the network said.<\/p>\n

It said it had also been made aware of instances where network providers are charging customers more to cancel their contracts early than to stay in their contract for the full term.<\/p>\n

The infographic below shows how much\u00a0subscribers will have to pay their network to\u00a0cancel a contract.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The cost of terminating your cellphone contract<\/p><\/div>\n

Vodacom early contract cancellation<\/h3>\n

Vodacom said it uses the following formula for\u00a0contract cancellations:<\/p>\n

Full Monthly Fee \u00d7<\/strong> months remaining \u00d7<\/strong> 75% +<\/strong> bill for outstanding usage<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Since Vodacom\u2019s cancellation fee is always a fraction of the remaining monthly fees, it said there is no scenario where its termination charge would be more expensive than keeping the contract.<\/p>\n

Telkom early contract cancellation<\/h3>\n

Telkom said it requires subscribers to give a 20-business day written contract termination notice.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 20 business days written notice rule is within the CPA guidelines,\u201d said Telkom.<\/p>\n

It then uses the following formula to calculate the early termination fee:<\/p>\n

R800 +<\/strong>\u00a0Device Subsidy \u00d7<\/strong> months remaining +<\/strong> bill for outstanding usage<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cWe do not factor in the service fee for the remainder of the contract, as customers should not have to pay for the balance of the service that they are not going to use.”<\/p>\n

MTN early contract cancellation<\/h3>\n

MTN said its early contract cancellation policy is to recover the outstanding device subsidy, and adds the next month\u2019s subscription:<\/p>\n

Device Subsidy \u00d7<\/strong> months remaining +<\/strong> next month\u2019s subscription +<\/strong> bill for outstanding usage<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

However, a number of MTN subscribers have complained that their early-cancellation quotes were not based on this formula.<\/p>\n

Instead, they were required to pay the remaining service fees on their contract, plus an early termination charge:<\/p>\n

R1,710 +<\/strong> Service Fee \u00d7<\/strong> months remaining +<\/strong> bill for outstanding usage<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Some subscribers complained that this resulted in their cancellation fee being more than just staying in the contract for the remainder of its term.<\/p>\n

MTN was asked about this second termination fee calculation, but the company did not respond by the time of publication.<\/p>\n

More on cellphone contracts in South Africa<\/h3>\n

Our competitors are preventing their unhappy customers from leaving: Cell C<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Cell C R10,000 Contract Buy-out \u201cphenomenal\u201d success<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Hidden cost to move your Vodacom, MTN contract to Cell C<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

How Cell C\u2019s R10,000 Buy-Out works<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Cell C giving subscribers R10,000 to cancel their Vodacom, MTN contract<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is what your mobile network will charge you to cancel your cellphone contract early.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":105971,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[355,35,42,109,41],"class_list":["post-131546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cellular","tag-cell-c","tag-headline","tag-mtn","tag-telkom","tag-vodacom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131546"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131546"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131546\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":131618,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131546\/revisions\/131618"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/105971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}