I am writing this complaint as I am unable find a contact other then the call center to assist me with the customer services issue. I did try to contact a Mr Sean Pretorius, who I was told was your customer services manager but he refused to take my call, as I was told that he did not take calls from customers. Which is rather strange for a customer services manager. I have unfortunately suffered a series service issues at the hands of Autopage Cellular over the past month, but what is more frustrating is that there is no channel to which to direct this feedback to.


1. I took out at contract with Autopage at the end of September 2010. I waited more then 24hrs and the sim was not activated. I called the call center, by they didn’t know what was going on, eventually they did manage to figure it out. The store in Vodaworld FORGOT TO PROCESS THE CONTRACT!!! Wait here is more, they said that someone from the store would call me, but big surprise no one did, I had to call them! I thought that that was appalling customer service, but wait there is more.
2. This was my second contract Autopage, I have had another one for the last 10 years. When I took out the new contract I took my old sim along to RICA, obviously because when you take out a new contract you need to RICA at the same time. It was all under my old account. Then I got an SMS on my old sim a few weeks later requesting me to RICA!!! They managed to stuff that up as well! So now I have to go back to a store to RICA the old SIM again! I thought that this was unbelievable, but wait there is more.
3. When I took my new contract out I took out the Blackberry BIS, instead of BES. Reason being that I was not sure if my organisation supported BES, therefore I asked the sales agent. I was told you can always change from BIS to BES, no hassles, will take 24hrs. When the time came a few weeks later to change from BIS to BES, then the story changed! Now I was told that I had to complete a migration request form and pay migration fees as well! I was flabbergasted, especially given the previous service issues already encountered, but wait there is more.
4. So I completed the migration form, before the cut off date as requested by Auto page. I had to send it about 3 times because they could not find it, which was not surprising. In any event I received confirmation that the migration would go through on the 1 November 2010. Guess what, it didn’t!!! At this point I was lost for words, not to mention extremely upset, however not very surprised but wait there is more.
5. On the 2nd Nov 2010 I called the Autopage “Customer Care” services. I spoke to a women, whose name I cannot recall. I explained the problem to her, and gave her my number. She then place me on hold…. FOR THE NEXT 30MINS !!! Realising that she was not going to pick, probably gone on her lunch break, I hung up and called back.
6. I then spoke to a women named Angela, I explained the problem to her, and gave her my number. She to put me on hold, but only for a few minutes. She informed me that the service has been activated on the Autopage system as BES but was still reflected as BIS on the Network. Probably some sort of failure node to node between Autopage and VC network provisioning interface. She said that she would log it with VC and this would be fixed in 24hrs. I asked to speak to a supervisor but was told that “all the managers are in meetings”, How convenient. It was however not fixed the next day.
7. I called and spoke to another agent, named Godfrey, he initially insisted that the service was activated correctly, evidently he was not able to distinguish between BIS & BES, but finally caught on after I explained it to him a few times. To which he gave me the same reply as Angela did the previous day, that he was going log it with the network. He went further to tell me that he did not think it will be activated this month!!! He also said that there was nothing that they (Autopage) could do other then send an e-mail. I asked him to escalate the matter, but he said there was nothing more that could be done. I asked if I could speak to a manager, to which I was asked as to why I wanted to speak to a manager as there is nothing that they can do. After some argument, guess what, he told me “all the managers are in meetings” . . . what an unbelievable coincidence.
8. That was when I called the Head office and asked for the customer services manager, whom I was told was Sean Pretorius. I was transferred, but go through to someone else who told me that he was not available and gave me a phone number and e-mail address, both of which turned out to be false. This was not surprising, by this point this was the kind behaviour that fitted the Autopage culture.
9. Not wanting to give up, I tried to call again, eventually getting through to a women who informed me that Mr Pretorius did not wish to take my call, as he does not take calls from customers. Which I found rather strange and odd, that the customer services manager is not interested in customer services issue. I think that that peace of information actually summed up quiet nicely the organisation that I was dealing with.

Somebody stole my phone on 9 Sept 2009, I did the sim swop on Monday 14th Sept 2009. I struggled about a week to get my card activated, this was eventually done on Monday the 21st Sept 2009. On 22 September I received an sms from Autopage telling me my account was R12 443.02. I phoned Autopage and they said it was a mistake my account was RR328.25, (can'tt remember the correct amount). I received another sms of this amount and I phoned again, this operator informed me that there is fraud involved and the Fraud department was busy with the investigation. On Friday 25 Sept a Candice phoned me and told me there were international calls made from the handset that she phoned me on during that weekend. My phone was not open for International calls and my handset was one of my daughter that I am borrowing. I did a detailed affidavit and faxed it on Monday 28 Sept. Candice said I must make arrangement for payments with a Felicia on 05 Oct on the following nr. 011 650 2736 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 011 650 2736 end_of_the_skype_highlighting. I could not get hold of this person and send a fax to Candice to informed her. I also send Candice 2 faxes in connection with strange phone calls on that number. Since then nobody came back to me since then.

On purchasing a Blackberry with a pay in of R400 on top up of R200 per month, I was told to pay in an additional R59 per month. The consultant was unaware of this and I was told to dial 173 for internet settings, then 808, then back to Autopage after holding on for 10 minutes to get through to the technical department. Recodings were checked after I wanted to return the phone, as the consultant did not tell me that if I use the Blackberry it cannot be returned. I then returned the cell phone which the couriers collected, but I am now being asked for the egg trays which was in the box for the Blackberry, surley Autopage's warehouse is stocked with these, and wont the couriers fees add up to more than the cost of these egg trays. Autopage also refused to match another cell phone contract. So much for retaining customers. I am now awaiting a credit of R400 from Autopage, but the invoice for this was generated very timeoulsy for misleading sale.

I had to do a SIM swop to get a new SIM card because my new phone would not pick up my old one. The guy behind the desk told me that I had to wait 4 - 24 hours for my new SIM card to be activated. That was on the 2nd of October. It's now the 4th of October and I'm still waiting for the SIM card to be activated.

Is this normal? Is there anyone that has had the same problems as I have? How is this possible?!

My line was blocked after I contacted Autopage on 3 seperate occations to update to my new billing details. Even after payment was recieved, Autopage still decided to block the line Restoring my line took another 5 days. I phoned each day to ask them to fix it. All they said was that there is no barring on the line and that it should come back on in 24 hrs. Eventually a store clerk saw that there was a 'soft block' on the line.

Even the manager Jocelyne at Autopage customer service was unable to see that there is a 'soft block'. She also chose to ignore return calls after she incorrectly tried to transfer me whilst I was on the line with her.

So thanks Jocelyne, you get a titillating 5 for incompetence.

So 2 store visits. 7 phone calls an 5 days of no service and I can finally use my phone again. I will be sure to leave Autopage in 4 months when my contract expires.

Now lets see if they can debit the correct account next month. Holding thumbs.