MOBILE PHONE SCANDALS Yes Ufone tum hi to ho!

It seems like telecom service providers across Pakistan are resorting to desperate measures to make a quick buck out of their customers. I have been a loyal ufone customer for quite a number of years now but I have been driven to a point of utmost disgust!

Last year my postpaid billing experience was a super nightmare where I ended up paying Rs8,000 in one month without even having used the service worth that much. Even after making countless visits and calls to the customer center in Clifton I was never given any clarity on this exorbitant bill amount. Even then they drove me to a point where I lost my patience chasing their managers without getting a single satisfactory response for the various requests I'd filed to see the detailed bill. Losing so much money I converted back to prepaid letting this billing fiasco go as bygone. But ufone doesn't want to give up! It wants to fleece the customer even by a Rupee whenever they get the chance, even if that means NOT INFORMING THE CUSTOMER. Let me outline what all they have subjected me to since the past few months.

First they start bombarding you with promotional SMSes. Then the unnecessary and uncalled for deluge of useless value added services. If it was just a notification it could surely be ignored. But a "Dear customer your VAS has been activated" SMS I'm sure is followed by a thought that screams 'Here, use our VAS that you never even requested for. We will give you this for free for a month. We are confident you will forget to deactivate it and we will then get the license to rob you off your credit every month for activation and daily charges for the same'.

My first reaction to such underhanded tactics is absolute confusion. The first proper thought I have is 'Oh! I must deactivate this so that I don't lose all my credit for something I didn't even subscribe to. I should do this now before I am punished in case I forget to deactivate this "FREE VALUE ADDED SERVICE"'. The fact that this interesting detail about the 'FREE VAS' was only revealed after way too many holds and after wasting 10 to 15 minutes on the helpline, which I might add is also charged, talking to a customer services rep who can't wait to hang up your call.

A few days later another SMS read "Dear customer you are now subscribed to Ubuddy. Now you can track your friends anywhere they go". Now why would I want to do something like that?! Do I not have a life? Or should I buy a cat and call it life to prove it?!?! I called up the helpline to ask what the hell this is. The far from eloquent response I get from yet another near suicidal helpline rep was "Oh Maam, its free". The thought that I read behind that was 'We want you to experience our desperate measures to undermine competition. But we are hiding the costs of this activation from you unless you ask us the dreaded cost question'.

I asked "So am I being charged?" The ufone helpline rep casually utters "Oh yes! Of course Maam. Until you deactivate this service you will be charged Rs. XYZ per month." I can recall that I couldn't help but think 'WOW! I absolutely MUST deactivate this stalker VAS. Even a single Rupee is precious to me. And why shouldn't it be?! Why should I just dish out my hard earned money to these uncalled for value added services? As it is the taxes they cut from our credit transfer and card recharges have never been disclosed. Who knows where they go? More so the so called 'Amazing Packages' namely Uth package offers a call to Friends and Family (FnF) for Rs2.99 for the first two minutes and then free for the hour.

What they conveniently omit to mention is that 'We (ufone) will cut off signals and give you bad network coverage so that you have to cut off your call every 10 minutes in order to dial again for the Rs2.99 and then FREE! If we don't give you bad network how will we make money? And yes, we are competing with international call rates and we claim to be best but we go on compromising QUALITY because we don't want connections. We want MONEY, MONEY AND MORE MONEY! So if you're dying and your call is not getting through please remember someone is making money out of your death. This may help you die in peace!

Oh no! I am getting carried away. I need to talk about the very important and very essential VALUE ADDED SERVICE. It was a fresh evening of Ramazan when I am about to indulge in the goodies at Iftar when I receive a pleasant SMS from ufone which read "Dear Customer, your requested VAS has been activated". Samosa has now been put back on the plate and confusion has taken over my fasting mind. Without waiting even five minutes I call the ufone helpline. "Hello Ms. Beenish, this is Essa, how may I help you?" I go on to explain "Sorry for disturbing at Iftar time Essa but I needed to clarify this SMS I got from ufone about activation of VAS. I did not send any requests and I am confused about this activation." Essa requests "Please wait on line while we check" Meanwhile the clock is ticking and the Samosa are waiting. Minute later surprisingly I am put off hold and Essa says "Thank you for holding Ms. Beenish. As off today 31 August 2010 no VAS has been activated on your number. You can ignore the SMS."

I thank him for his assistance and continue to eat all I want.

1 September 2010, I find myself staring at an SMS that read "you have a missed call from xxxx at 1:37 pm." Interesting SMS but wasn't my VAS inactivated?! I called the helpline in severe puzzlement! Some lady from customer center picked up and here I am too angry to remember her name. "Yes so I checked yesterday, ufone help said no service was activated and now I get this SMS proving otherwise. Why?" The lady responded "Yes, it's activated." I question "Why is it active? I never sent any request. How much credit have you cut off?" She responds "Please wait on line Maam." Holding listening to Quranic Ayats wondering how much integrity is ufone left with. The lady hits the off hold button and says"Yes Maam, would you like to deactivate?" I instantly retorted, "Hello! That's a secondary concern. My primary concern is how it activated itself in the first place, knowing I sent no request." She tries to explain "Yes Maam, you sent NO request but let me confirm that without permission of the customers ufone does not activate any services." I couldn't help but respond in anger "Really, that's what I am saying HOW it activated itself?" She goes on to explain "Yes Maam, we are confirming that we do not activate without permission. An automated call was sent to all customers. If you did not follow instructions it would not have activated." Still confused I say "Okay so I missed the call does that mean it got activated? " She responds "No Maam, if you missed the call it could not have gotten activated." Still puzzled I say "So how did it activate?" Yet again she says "Maam, would you like to deactivate this?" Furious now at the implication of lying "Arghhhh! So I am lying? Is that it?" Ignoring my annoyance "Maam, would you like to deactivate? If so please dial blah blah blah blah…" and then line is cut off. How? Bad network or did the lady feel that this customer is going to start with a list of things so I must cut her off now….

Oh might I add, this is a seemingly small amount of 83 Paisas + tax DAILY but with 20 million customers imagine how much money 83 paisas+tax along with activation charges makes them?

Is there any explanation to all of this NONSENSE? Is this what I get for being a loyal customer? Or loyalty and quality are now the least important aspects of this once glorious industry? How much more credit am I donating to this company without my knowledge? Are they really in need of these donations? Maybe we can have a chanda per year for them also. At least we will get a better service!

Ufone: Cheap call rates, CHEAP Service, CHEAP attempts to make money, CHEAP COMPANY! Yes ufone tum hi to ho!

-Beenish Qureshi

-MOBILE WORLD Magazine, October-2010 issue. www.mobileworld.com.pk