Mobile Broadband

[georgia83]

Hi,

My mother has been using a Vodafone mobile broadband USB and while it has always been quite slow, the speed has decreased dramatically over the past few weeks. It is also now displaying a message that the 3G volumes have been exceeded. I do not know what this means. I went into the Vodafone store yesterday to discuss these issues and the staff were friendly but said they were unable to do anything so I had to call the call centre. When I called the call centre, unfortunately I didn't know the pin on the account and neither did my mother. I was told that they were unable to help me unless I could give them the pin. I asked if they could verify the account with other information such as address or date of birth as I have done for numerous other companies, but was told they couldn't do anything without the pin. When I asked to speak to a superviser, I was told that they could not put me through to a superviser unless I could give them the access pin.

We did manage to eventually guess the pin on the account but when I explained the situation, I was told that the account looked fine and what did I want them to do about it? When I told them that the store had suggested that the USB device may not be compatible with recent network upgrades and that they could send out a new device, I was transferred for the third time, to another department.

I am happy to provide further information so that somebody can actually look at the account and suggest how it can be improved, but frankly, with the customer service I have just received, I actually think it would be easier to cancel the contract and move to anopther supplier as I am not getting the level of service that I signed up for. 

[Bruno]

Hi georgia83,

georgia83 wrote:

My mother has been using a Vodafone mobile broadband USB and while it has always been quite slow, the speed has decreased dramatically over the past few weeks. It is also now displaying a message that the 3G volumes have been exceeded. I do not know what this means.

Looking at the coverage that you should be getting in Caulfield North, I can see that there is full signal on our 850 network, though there is an outage affecting a small area where Howitt Rd and Balaclava Rd intersect. If this is near your location, it may be causing some issues for her connection speed.

Can you also please let me know what kind of modem she is using? (a model number would be great if you have it handy) That way I can check that the modem she is using is able to connect to our 850 network layer, which will give her the best possible performance.

georgia83 wrote:

When I called the call centre, unfortunately I didn't know the pin on the account and neither did my mother. I was told that they were unable to help me unless I could give them the pin. I asked if they could verify the account with other information such as address or date of birth as I have done for numerous other companies, but was told they couldn't do anything without the pin. When I asked to speak to a superviser, I was told that they could not put me through to a superviser unless I could give them the access pin.

We are required to confirm an account PIN before we are able to access a customer account to ensure the security of your mother's account information and protect her privacy.

I can appreciate how frustrating it can be when you can't remember a PIN and we do have a process in place to confirm some more specific information when you can't remember an account PIN. Your mother should have been given the option to answer a number of security questions to verify her as the account holder. 

I'm sorry that you weren't given this option when you spoke to us and that is definitely not the kind of experience we want you to have when you ask us for help with a service.

georgia83 wrote:

I am happy to provide further information so that somebody can actually look at the account and suggest how it can be improved, but frankly, with the customer service I have just received, I actually think it would be easier to cancel the contract and move to anopther supplier as I am not getting the level of service that I signed up for. 

I'd really like to take a look at this for you and see exactly what I can do to improve your mother's service performance (and hopefully restore some of your faith in us).

Can you please email me at online.help@vodafone.com.au with the code C254CBFNI in the subject field. In your email can you please include the infromation explained in this link here.

Once I've received your email with the information that I've requested, I will give you a call and look at what I need to do to have this sorted out for you as quickly as possible. In the meantime, please let me know if you have any other questions or if there is anything else that I can help you with.

Cheers,

-Bruno.

[georgia83]

Thanks for your reply Bruno, I have sent you an email with the info you requested.