[kictanet] Safaricom Attitude - Consumer Issues

Mon Aug 23 22:49:15 EAT 2010

Hi Edith,

What a sad and unfortunate experience. Mr Joseph has a rare opportunity. The
opportunity to leave a legacy of great customer service and positive brand
sentiment in the face of aggressive competition. What Ms Bernice displayed
today is an organizational culture (positive in itself) where the staff own
the brand to the extent of taking competition personally. That in itself is
hard to do. Even harder to do is maintain civility and great service when
the public you are dealing with are obviously inclined to the competition.
CCK may not have the power to force telcos to be civil so Safaricom doesn't
have to be nice to consumers.

Such a culture is obviously counter-productive. A sincere apology would be
good business sense but a more sustainable approach would be an internal
education campaign to re-align the organisation to its primary objectives so
that their staff respond to customers not to the competition.

Kind regards,

Muchiri Nyaggah

Director

@muchiri

+254 722 506400

Semacraft.com

  _____  

From: kictanet-bounces+muchiri=semacraft.com at lists.kictanet.or.ke
[mailto:kictanet-bounces+muchiri=semacraft.com at lists.kictanet.or.ke] On
Behalf Of Edith Adera
Sent: 23 August 2010 22:28
To: muchiri at semacraft.com
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions
Subject: [kictanet] Safaricom Attitude - Consumer Issues
Importance: High

There's need for consumer issues to be taken VERY seriously in the Kenyan
Telecommunication market. I believe CCK is listening and this should not be
allowed to happen to any Kenyan consumer. 

As a non-user of money transfer services (I'm a proxy user), I decided to
try the Mpesa service today as I did not have a 3rd party proxy to undertake
the transaction on my behalf as I usually do. The last I tried to register
for the service, I was informed that I had an old generation SIM card and
needed to replace it yet the agent did not have the replacement SIMs. I was
directed to follow a convoluted process of getting the replacement SIM,
which I did not have the time for at that point.

Today, I was rudely informed that as a non registered user I cannot send
money by Mpesa (Prestige service provider) - never mind that I have a very
active Safaricom line. This puzzled me as in the banking sector, you can
always bank money into any account at a bank in which you're not a "member".

So in search for an answer to this issue, I decided to call a Safaricom
Officer (Ms Bernice - department that issues Short Codes) to get some
assistance. I called her on my Zain line. As soon as she picked the call,
she was very cold and retorted "for starters, you have called me from the
wrong network - meaning from Zain - and secondly, you cannot send money if
you are not a registered user".

My issue as a consumer is - why should I be rebuked for using my Zain line
to call Safaricom? Is it a Safaricom policy that no one should call them
using a Zain line or lines from other network providers? what does the CCK
regulations say about such issues? My little telecommunication background
tells me that the "consumer is king" and that a consumer must exercise their
"right of choice" in a competitive market. why should I be dictated to what
network I MUST USE or NOT use to make calls? Is this a reflection of the
interconnection issues that are currently hitting media headlines?

I have taken this issue very seriously and demand an apology and response
from Safaricom. I believe CCK will take appropriate action to ensure that
this is not the modus operandi in the Kenyan telecommunication market.

Edith

Kenyan Consumer      

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