The cellphone networks, which do rather well out of our collective obsession with staying connected via our ever-more-clever handsets, have been disappointingly slow to embrace aspects of the Consumer Protection Act which don’t suit them. Chief among these is the stipulation that all pre-paid vouchers must be honoured for up to three years. That means that any goods or services you pay for in advance – from a bus coupon to a facial to cellphone airtime – must be redeemed within three years of the date of purchase, and companies no longer have the right to tell you one or three months down the line “sorry, it’s expired, you forfeit”.
The cellphone companies appear to be carrying on regardless, in this and other respects, while promising the National Consumer Commission that they’ll get their act together within three months. Jerry Buirski told Consumer watch as he approached the Cape by sea last week that he noticed he had Vodacom’s 3G signal, so he powered up his laptop and prepared to send a month’s worth of e-mails. “However, I found I’d lost all my unused data on June 30. This does not seem right at all.”
National Consumer Commissioner Mamodupi Mohlala has recently publicly repeated the commission’s stance that all pre-paid airtime and data must be redeemable for up to three years in terms of the CPA. Asked to respond to Buirski’s experience, Vodacom’s chief officer of corporate affairs, Portia Maurice, said: “The commissioner has requested us to investigate this aspect of the act and present further submissions in support of our current business practices. We are currently reviewing this and will provide a response to the commissioner.”
Last month, when questioned on the premature expiry of pre-paid data, Vodacom told Consumer Watch: “When customers purchase data bundles, funds are deducted from their airtime in return for access to data bundles. So they are deemed to have exchanged the value of their prepaid airtime for access to data bundles. “There’s a difference between a voucher and a product bought by that voucher. The three-year expiry rule refers to vouchers and not to products purchased by vouchers.”
But Mohlala doesn’t agree with this interpretation, insisting that pre-paid data may not “expire” within three years of purchase. “We’ve had long discussions with the industry and I’ve made it clear that if they are not willing to come to the party on this and other issues of compliance with the act, we have the power to issue a compliance notice,” Mohlala said.
The ultimate sanction, in terms of the CPA, is a fine of R1 million or 10 percent of annual turnover. But subscribers continue to be deprived of cell products they’ve paid for a few months previously. Gary Cousins told Consumer Watch that he bought R300 of airtime for his teenage son in early March which was loaded on to his (son’s) number. But by early June, three months later, despite having used only about half that amount, his son was unable to send SMSes. “I suspected that the remaining airtime had been ‘removed’, so I sent him another R50 on July 10, and his phone immediately started sending SMSes,” Cousins said. “A balance enquiry showed R50 airtime remaining.”
So I asked Cell C: “Is it true that by early June the unused portion of that R300 airtime ‘expired’? “If so, how is this justified?” This was the response I got: “Icasa (the Independent Communications Authority of SA) is in the process of applying to the National Consumer Commission for an exemption with regards to this aspect of the act. Until the process is complete, Cell C cannot comment on the matter.”
Interestingly, Icasa’s concern about the CPA’s provision that pre-paid vouchers be redeemable by consumers for up to three years has to do with the recycling of numbers. But Icasa is not in favour of consumers losing out on pre-paid airtime and data. Icasa councillor Fungai Sibanda told Consumer Watch: “Icasa is of the view that consumers must be protected with respect to unused credit, whilst at the same time allowing inactive numbers to be recycled.” But right now pre-paid cellphone users are continuing to be “robbed” of their unused airtime and data – almost four months after the CPA came into effect.
Source: IoL
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