Open letter to Vodafone CEO Guy Lawrence Reference Astonishingly bad customer service

HugoSP

To be fair, I don't think I ever directly got blamed for anything. It's just that when I contacted the few who would take responsibility, despite their best efforts, they just made things worse.

John, who appears at the end of the letter, is obviously both conciencious and well trained/equipped enough to resolve things.

I know that the company is going through a major restructuring programme and, unfortunately this is being pushed through with little thought as to how it affects customer service.

HugoSP

Just a note to thank Lee of the Web Relations Team, posting as Vodafone Company Representative.

I took him up on his offer to furnish him with my details and about 20 minutes later I received a call from him.

Essentially it looks like my issues are definitely sorted, but he's keeping an eye on them.

My next hope is that my comments will be taken forward to help hardworking Vodafone employees manage customers' accounts better.


Nice to talk to you Lee


Thanks a lot!

Helen*_4

Hello,

I thought you might be interested to read about the terrible customer service that I received from Vodaphone. I am hoping that posting it on here will act as a warning to others considering taking out a contract with Vodaphone, and also as a message to Vodaphone that their customers will not put up with this sort of service for much longer before they start leaving in their droves.
I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has had a similar experience! Sorry the letter is so long, but as you will see, it's a bit of a saga.

Thanks,

Helen


Dear Sir / Madam,

Firstly, I would like to take this opportunity to officially cancel my contract. I would be grateful if you would consider this my written notice and confirm it with me in writing by email within 24 hours.
I am unclear whether I am expected to give 30 days notice because I have been given conflicting information from several of your call-centre staff, over a long period of time. However, I as I will explain at the end of my email, I expect that as a matter of courtesy this requirement will be waived, and my contact will end on 18th October, with no further charges from this point.

In the week beginning 13th September I called Vodaphone to give my 30 days notice to cancel my current contract, and to ask about the possibility of taking out a two year i-phone contract. I was told at this stage that I had called up two weeks previously (on the third September), extended by contract by two years and ordered a Blackberry to an address in Hertfordshire. Clearly I did not do this, and I was told that a fraud investigation would be conducted on my account.

I would have thought that there would be some security measures in place to ensure that a phone is not delivered to an address that is not the registered address on the contract, and is also not an address listed on the electoral register for the individual who owns the account. Apparently without checking anything of the sort, a Blackberry was dispatched to an address miles from my own, under my name, and I began to be billed for a £30 a month Blackberry contract that I had never asked for.

When I complained about this I was told that Vodaphone didn’t know that it wasn’t me that took out the contract, so there was nothing I could do but pay for it, and wait for them to get back to me.
I have phoned Vodaphone repeatedly for the last month, and been greeted by absolute incompetence and rudeness on almost every occasion. At no point during the last month has anyone at Vodaphone phoned me to let me know what is happening on my account, on every occasion I have had to chase information, and not at any point have I received an apology for the treatment that I have received.
On one occasion I was told that the fraud case ‘looked like’ it had been sorted, and I could probably go and get a new phone contract. I then spent an hour in a phone shop arranging a new contract, called Vodaphone to double check that I was able to cancel my contract, and was told that I could do no such thing because the fraud investigation was still ongoing. This was a total waste of my time, and another example of the sheer unprofessionalism and incompetence from your staff.

There were some good elements about the way my case was handled, eventually I was refunded for the excess I paid on top of my own contract to cover the Vodaphone contract. I was also told that when the fraud investigation was over I would no longer have to give 30 days notice, as I had been trying to do so for several weeks. However, I was not called to be told that my account had been credited or about the change to the notice period required, just as it was only by me calling that I found out about the fraud in the first place.
At this stage I was told that I could do nothing until the fraud investigation was completed, and I just had to wait for them to contact me. I asked how long this was likely to be, and the woman on the phone became quite irate and rude and told me that it might be tomorrow, it might be in six weeks time, she didn’t know. She also told me that I would receive written notification from the fraud team or a phone call to let me know when the investigation was complete.
I then left it a week before calling again, to see if there was any progress with the investigation. At this stage I was told that it ‘looked like’ the investigation might be over, but I should wait to be contacted by the fraud team officially.

I then left it another week before calling again yesterday. At this stage I was told that the fraud investigation was definitely complete, but that if I wanted to end my contract I had to given 30 days written notice. I queried at this point why I had not been contacted by the fraud team to let me know that the investigation was over and I was free to end my contract and I was told that ‘the fraud team is not a customer facing team’ and it is not standard practice to notify a customer when a fraud investigation concludes on their account.
Firstly, if this is true, it is an absolutely appalling practice and a terrible example of customer service. If it is not true, then your customer services staff are either lying or incompetent.

I have been with Vodaphone for over two years, I have always paid by bills on time, and was about to upgrade to a premium i-phone contract. I should be a valued customer. And yet the way I have been treated is as though I am stupid, a liar and an inconvenience to your staff. If I were a more vulnerable person, or someone not aware of my rights as a consumer I would undoubtedly have given up and ended up staying on this rolling contract, which, it is entirely possible, was the intention.

I would like Vodaphone to acknowledge that not only was insufficient care taken to protect my personal details in the first place, leading to criminal activity in my account and incorrect charges being taken from my account, but that the customer service that I received was not satisfactory.

When an individual’s account is subject to a fraud investigation, it should be possible to speak to the same customer services advisor throughout the investigation. It should also not be unreasonable to expect that Vodaphone would keep the customer informed about the investigation, be consistent and honest with the information that the customer is provided with, and if it is proven (as in this case) that the customer has done nothing wrong, that Vodaphone should apologise for the inconvenience. I have, as yet, still not been reassured that my data is safe. In order to access my account I assume that the individual concerned must have had access to my address, post code and date of birth. I don’t know what other details they were able to get hold of from the Vodaphone staff regarding my personal account, but I believe it would be reasonable to expect some form of reassurance from Vodaphone on this count.

In addition to receiving an apology for the way in which I have been treated over the last month, I do not expect to have to provide 30 days notice to end my contract, as I have attempted to do this on several occasions, and not been able to do so. I would also appreciate, as a matter of courtesy, to be refunded for the period from the point at which the fraud investigation began to this date, as, again through no fault of my own, I was unable to cancel my contract.
As I mentioned previously, I contacted Vodaphone just over a month ago to try to upgrade my contract and extend it for another two years.

As a direct result of the poor customer service that I have received, and my loss of faith in the ability of Vodaphone to take care of my personal deails, I now intend to cancel my contract as of 18/10/2010, I would appreciate confirmation within 24 hours that this has happened, and that I will not be charged from that point, and I would like a full apology for, and explanation of the service that I have received.

I will look forward to hearing from you.

nozza001

I have also been on the end of appalling service from Vodaphone, Please see below the e-mail sent to Guy Laurence (its a bit long but says it all really!!)

Good evening,

I fully appreciate that you may be inundated with letters or complaints and I fully appreciate that you will pass this complaint on to someone more suitable but I feel that I have to make you aware of my issues with your Customer Services Department, particularly your offices in India/Egypt, and your web team.

I fully anticipate that you will take this complaint seriously and ensure it is dealt with promptly and in the appropriate manner.

My complaint originates from a member of your team who should have ported across a payg phone number to replace the number of the new contract sim I purchased from a deal with Carphone Warehouse. Instead of completing this simple task someone did not port the number across, instead they amended the payg sim changing it to a contract sim and they did not cancel the sim purchased with the original contract from Carphone Warehouse.

This meant I suddenly had an additional contract I had never requested, authorised, or signed for. In addition to this I was not informed that my direct debits would be aligned causing more money to come out of my account.

It was only when I called the customer services technical team and they told me that I had 3 contracts (including my own purchased last year) that anyone realised an error had been made.

I was advised to pursue this with Carphone Warehouse as the original contract was set up by them. After days of seeking a resolution they finally confirmed that they had cancelled that contract leaving me with my own contract and my daughters contract. Due to an ongoing complaint with Carphone Warehouse they declined taking back the phone as an offer of goodwill.

I was informed in writing that Vodafone had taken full responsibility for the error and to speak to them regarding compensation.

It was at this point where things got even worse, your Customer Contact Centre is supposed to be a place where you uphold the Vodafone brand, attempt to build on the customer relationship, and attempt to resolve any issues to the best possible outcome.
I am not sure as to whether this information has been cascaded down to your staff?

On my 1st call to 191 I was greeted by a women from Egypt. She advised me she was a 'Senior Advisor', I asked her to confirm that was her actual job title, she said "yes". Now considering I work for one of the biggest organisations in London it wasn't difficult for me to understand by her responses and body language/tone of voice she was actually lying. Once explaining the scenario and the impact on myself and my expectations of compensation she proceeded to laugh at me down the phone. She had only offered to waive the fee for the contract I never asked for in the first place and offer £20 as goodwill. I immediately refused this offer and asked for her knowledge of the laws in the UK and guidelines with regards to contracts and sale of goods, to which she replied that she did not have knowledge on this. I requested to speak to her manager as I felt she was not in a position to handle my complaint she replied 'ok' in a patronising voice, I expressed my disappointment that she had said ok in that manner and that I found it patronising, she then proceeded to say exactly the same thing in the same tone straight after!! She also stated that she did not have any reference number to give to me.
I requested a call back within an hour and she explained that it could take up to 24 hours.

A 'Manager' called me back 1.5 hours later and expressed his disappointment at what had happened and that he 'valued my custom' and that he could credit my account for the month totalling £129, when I asked him why the bill was so high it was at this point it was explained to me the additional payments would have to be taken for the amended direct debits. I said I was not happy with this as £40 of this was for something I never asked for in the first place. He then proceeded to offer £50 then £70 extra as a goodwill gesture. I again declined this explaining I wanted to resolve the issue before I took legal advice but the amount offered was no where near my valuation. He explained he would call me back on Saturday 9th October (3 days later) I requested that no action was to be taken until a resolution had been agreed but he never called. I later also found out that the credit had been applied after my request for that not to happen.

When I spoke to an agent on 191 the next day he insisted I repeat all of the information all over again before he could get someone to call back. I begrudgingly did this and received a call from someone who called himself 'James', the line went dead after I accidentially dropped the phone. James left a message at 20:11 saying he was trying to call me back. I called 191 straight afterwards only to be told by an agent that 'James' did not work in the office.

I then expressed for a manager to come onto the phone. I was passed to Magid Kamal who stated he was a manager. I later found out by his own admission he was only deputising as it was a Sunday. I had to repeat my issue all over again, Magid explained again I was a valued customer and he wanted to resolve the issue before I took it further through Ofcom etc. He explained that a credit of £129 had been added plus an additional credit of £130.67 (which comprimised of previous months bills). I explained that I still did not feel that everything had been resolved as I now in theory had a sim card without a phone and I was paying more for this. Magid explained then he could not offer more and was deputising, but he would find out what else he could offer but he had restrictions in place. he stated he would speak to the initial manager as the notes were not up to date, I requested that he also should find out why I wasn't called back.

The next day Magid called to explain he spoke to the original manager I had spoken to previously and there was nothing else that could be done. I explained that I was unhappy with this as quite clearly my complaint had not been escalated as agreed in the original call on the Wednesday and Magid did not even find out why the manager did not bother to call me back. I explained that this was really poor from a person in a position of authority as both the main issues raised with him had not been resolved.

After a lengthy conversation, and explaining that in theory I am only on a sim only deal with Vodafone as you have not provided a phone with the contract I am no better off as I would, in theory, have to pay £180 for a new Blackberry. He again explained there was nothing else he could do and that the escalation procedure was to write into the web team. I questioned this immediately as I did not believe this to be the case, he assured me that calls were recorded, he repeated his name and stated that this was definately the case. He also stated that as there are no links between different departments he could not just pass my details on to the relevant manager.

Straight after the call I went onto your website to find that again this information was factually incorrect and he just wanted a difficult customer to go through other channels. He finally gave me a reference number - and advised me in a voicemail to contact the team via e-mail, even though every other agent said that reference numbers are not provided.

I then wrote to your team via the web form requesting that a manager called my as I had already escalated the case. The response I got is just shocking - please see unedited copy of reply at the end of this message.

I then found an 0808 number and eventually got through to Beccy from your Swansea office who was really understanding, informed me notes were made by the contact centre (another phone agent said there weren't any), and passed me through to her manager Katie Andrews. After having to repeat things again Katie was quite dismissive saying I had already received more than enough for a refund and after I expressed my concerns further she offered to suspend my contract and get an upgrade (basically get tied down to a new contract) in order to get a new phone, alternatively I could look at sim only deals. I was concerned that though she made it sound easy to do, the porting of 1 number to a different sim was also supposed to be easy! I explained I would have to speak to my partner but I was also still unhappy that the compensation in no way facilitates the service received, amendments to my account/credit file/breaches in contract and stress and time undertaken by myself to resolve this issue. She also asked my what I wanted but said she was 'not willing' to compensate further as I had already, in her eyes, been given too much.

My complaint has now been escalated to Geraint Pickavance. I am sure, as according to Katie who has already pre-empted that Geraint will not offer any more with regards to this, I will not get a favourable response from him which is why I have no alternative but to go to the top.

I trust that after reading all of this information and doing the relevant follow through you can clearly see the shortfalls in performance and, lets just say 'miscommunication', as well as the issues around the contract etc lead to an overwhelming case against Vodafone.

As I have said all along I would rather resolve this issue before getting 3rd party involvement through seeking legal advice or through Ofcom and I hope we can agree a suitable outcome before it gets to that stage.

I anticipate a prompt reply to this and thank you in advance, below is the reply from someone in your web team who quite clearly has a poor level of understanding for the English language, and is quite clearly not the manager I requested a telephone reply from.

Kind Regards,



_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
To whom it may concern, my original e-mail stated I had been advised of using this procedure to escalate my complaint, having read this, quite frankly, awful e-mail response I would like someone from a senior management level to call me immediately regarding my complaint. If I do not receive a call I will be escalating my complaint through you customer services director and ofcom. I look forward to your prompt action................



Hello,
I sincerely apologise for all the inconvenience caused as this is absolutely not the way Vodafone believes in serving its customers.
Your feedback is very important to us and will be used for training our employees to deliver better customer service. Your comments/feedback will allow us to serve you with products and services matched even better to your exact needs in the future.
I have attempted to call you today in order to resolve your query, although unfortunately I didn't get to speak to you.
As per the notes on the account I confirm that we've already given you the credit for the inconvenience which you've face due to direct debit.
Just to let you know that we are not allow to change any account detail without your knowledge. However, considering one of case after consulting the manager we've applied the credit of £260.53 on your account for goodwill gesture.
We won't be able to credit further, that is the best what we've done.
Trust this helps.
Kind regards,






Saif Khan
Vodafone Customer Services

drbesty

What happened to keeping it short and sweet? I can't even grasp the gist of your problem from reading that

nozza001

Yeah I did say it would be a long one!

Basically an account was set up without telling me, they amended my Direct Debit without telling me, charging me more for the month, their Customer Service team was awful, as was any manager I spoke to, and I am still not happy with the responses, especially that e-mail response!

Hopefully this shortens everything done, next time I wont copy the whole message.... was being a bit lazy!

nozza001

I'll keep this quick!

Got a response from CEO Office, after a bit of haggling, resolution found so FINALLY Vodafone have given the level of service they should have the whole way through!

We got there in the end!

Hopefully they will use the feedback to resolve the awful level of performance of their help desks!

watcherman

The only way I could get a satisfactory response was via the executive offive, "Tom" from the eforum team kept publicly lying that nothing more could be done, and when I posted for the benefit of others that the EO could help, "Tom" kept deleting the replies, and said I'd be banned if I kept letting other people know about this avenue of complaint. Despite the fact if I'd taken his incorrect advice, I'd have been stuck with a useless phone for 18mths, a contract the EO happily cancelled!

Vodafone

nozza001 wrote: »

I'll keep this quick!

Got a response from CEO Office, after a bit of haggling, resolution found so FINALLY Vodafone have given the level of service they should have the whole way through!

We got there in the end!

Hopefully they will use the feedback to resolve the awful level of performance of their help desks!

Hi nozza001,

Thanks for updating the thread to confirm that your case has now been resolved to your satisfaction.

In the event that anyone coming across this thread requires assistance then they're welcome to contact the Web Relations Team via the Contact us form on our website here quoting the code WRT135 in the subject line.

Should anyone encounter difficulties with this you can alternatively email us at webrelations@vodafone.com.

Best wishes,

Lee

Web Relations Team

Vodafone UK

Vodafone

Helen* wrote: »

Hello,

I thought you might be interested to read about the terrible customer service that I received from Vodaphone. I am hoping that posting it on here will act as a warning to others considering taking out a contract with Vodaphone, and also as a message to Vodaphone that their customers will not put up with this sort of service for much longer before they start leaving in their droves.
I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has had a similar experience! Sorry the letter is so long, but as you will see, it's a bit of a saga.

Thanks,

Helen


Dear Sir / Madam,

Firstly, I would like to take this opportunity to officially cancel my contract. I would be grateful if you would consider this my written notice and confirm it with me in writing by email within 24 hours.
I am unclear whether I am expected to give 30 days notice because I have been given conflicting information from several of your call-centre staff, over a long period of time. However, I as I will explain at the end of my email, I expect that as a matter of courtesy this requirement will be waived, and my contact will end on 18th October, with no further charges from this point.

In the week beginning 13th September I called Vodaphone to give my 30 days notice to cancel my current contract, and to ask about the possibility of taking out a two year i-phone contract. I was told at this stage that I had called up two weeks previously (on the third September), extended by contract by two years and ordered a Blackberry to an address in Hertfordshire. Clearly I did not do this, and I was told that a fraud investigation would be conducted on my account.

I would have thought that there would be some security measures in place to ensure that a phone is not delivered to an address that is not the registered address on the contract, and is also not an address listed on the electoral register for the individual who owns the account. Apparently without checking anything of the sort, a Blackberry was dispatched to an address miles from my own, under my name, and I began to be billed for a £30 a month Blackberry contract that I had never asked for.

When I complained about this I was told that Vodaphone didn’t know that it wasn’t me that took out the contract, so there was nothing I could do but pay for it, and wait for them to get back to me.
I have phoned Vodaphone repeatedly for the last month, and been greeted by absolute incompetence and rudeness on almost every occasion. At no point during the last month has anyone at Vodaphone phoned me to let me know what is happening on my account, on every occasion I have had to chase information, and not at any point have I received an apology for the treatment that I have received.
On one occasion I was told that the fraud case ‘looked like’ it had been sorted, and I could probably go and get a new phone contract. I then spent an hour in a phone shop arranging a new contract, called Vodaphone to double check that I was able to cancel my contract, and was told that I could do no such thing because the fraud investigation was still ongoing. This was a total waste of my time, and another example of the sheer unprofessionalism and incompetence from your staff.

There were some good elements about the way my case was handled, eventually I was refunded for the excess I paid on top of my own contract to cover the Vodaphone contract. I was also told that when the fraud investigation was over I would no longer have to give 30 days notice, as I had been trying to do so for several weeks. However, I was not called to be told that my account had been credited or about the change to the notice period required, just as it was only by me calling that I found out about the fraud in the first place.
At this stage I was told that I could do nothing until the fraud investigation was completed, and I just had to wait for them to contact me. I asked how long this was likely to be, and the woman on the phone became quite irate and rude and told me that it might be tomorrow, it might be in six weeks time, she didn’t know. She also told me that I would receive written notification from the fraud team or a phone call to let me know when the investigation was complete.
I then left it a week before calling again, to see if there was any progress with the investigation. At this stage I was told that it ‘looked like’ the investigation might be over, but I should wait to be contacted by the fraud team officially.

I then left it another week before calling again yesterday. At this stage I was told that the fraud investigation was definitely complete, but that if I wanted to end my contract I had to given 30 days written notice. I queried at this point why I had not been contacted by the fraud team to let me know that the investigation was over and I was free to end my contract and I was told that ‘the fraud team is not a customer facing team’ and it is not standard practice to notify a customer when a fraud investigation concludes on their account.
Firstly, if this is true, it is an absolutely appalling practice and a terrible example of customer service. If it is not true, then your customer services staff are either lying or incompetent.

I have been with Vodaphone for over two years, I have always paid by bills on time, and was about to upgrade to a premium i-phone contract. I should be a valued customer. And yet the way I have been treated is as though I am stupid, a liar and an inconvenience to your staff. If I were a more vulnerable person, or someone not aware of my rights as a consumer I would undoubtedly have given up and ended up staying on this rolling contract, which, it is entirely possible, was the intention.

I would like Vodaphone to acknowledge that not only was insufficient care taken to protect my personal details in the first place, leading to criminal activity in my account and incorrect charges being taken from my account, but that the customer service that I received was not satisfactory.

When an individual’s account is subject to a fraud investigation, it should be possible to speak to the same customer services advisor throughout the investigation. It should also not be unreasonable to expect that Vodaphone would keep the customer informed about the investigation, be consistent and honest with the information that the customer is provided with, and if it is proven (as in this case) that the customer has done nothing wrong, that Vodaphone should apologise for the inconvenience. I have, as yet, still not been reassured that my data is safe. In order to access my account I assume that the individual concerned must have had access to my address, post code and date of birth. I don’t know what other details they were able to get hold of from the Vodaphone staff regarding my personal account, but I believe it would be reasonable to expect some form of reassurance from Vodaphone on this count.

In addition to receiving an apology for the way in which I have been treated over the last month, I do not expect to have to provide 30 days notice to end my contract, as I have attempted to do this on several occasions, and not been able to do so. I would also appreciate, as a matter of courtesy, to be refunded for the period from the point at which the fraud investigation began to this date, as, again through no fault of my own, I was unable to cancel my contract.
As I mentioned previously, I contacted Vodaphone just over a month ago to try to upgrade my contract and extend it for another two years.

As a direct result of the poor customer service that I have received, and my loss of faith in the ability of Vodaphone to take care of my personal deails, I now intend to cancel my contract as of 18/10/2010, I would appreciate confirmation within 24 hours that this has happened, and that I will not be charged from that point, and I would like a full apology for, and explanation of the service that I have received.

I will look forward to hearing from you.

Hi Helen*,

After reading about what has happened here I'm genuinely sorry that the level of service you've received so far hasn't met your expectations.

As we're now aware of this we'd like to make sure that it gets resolved for you if you're still awaiting a satisfactory conclusion to this. As such could you email us at webrelations@vodafone.com and mark it for my attention and as soon as it reaches us I'll get back you as soon as I can?

In the meantime, I would like to clarify that whilst our Fraud Department are not customer facing they will usually confirm the outcome of an investigation where activity can be concluded as being fraudulent in writing together with additional guidance on how customers can protect their identity.

Kind regards and I look forward to hearing from you again soon.

Lee

Web Relations Team

Vodafone UK