Customers bemoan Airtel’s billing system

 …as customers complain of hidden daily, SMS charges

By AYOOLA OLAOLUWA

Subscribers to telecoms giant, Airtel Nigeria, have kicked against its exploitative billing system, calling on the Federal Government to prevail on the company to stop the exploitative charges and refund affected subscribers.

According to Business Hallmark findings, while many subscribers of the firm with almost 51 million users are charged a daily service fee of N115 from their first recharge, subscribers pay multiple charges on Short Message Service (SMS) sent out.

While our correspondent discovered that though the allegations of double charges on SMS are true, it only applies to people who compose and send more than one page.

While trying to confirm an allegation of double charges on SMS levelled against the company by a subscriber with sim number 08128378835, it was discovered that the normal charge of N4 was deducted when he sent a one-page text message. However, that was where the good story ended.

The subscriber was prompted by our correspondent to compose and send a two-page message. Few seconds after sending the message, he received a message from Airtel that the sum of N16 had been deducted from his account for the 186 words text message, instead of the normal N8 for two pages.

Also, a civil servant, Femi Robert’s, who is a subscriber on SmartConnect plan, cautioned the firm against inflicting pains on its customers, arguing that aggrieved customers may abandon it for others.

“I bought the line around October last year and was automatically assigned a SmartConnect tariff plan, been a new subscriber. However, I noticed that if I make any purchase below N115, I won’t be able to make calls. I always receive a prompter that I do not have sufficient fund to make my call. When I check for my balance, I will get  “You have N0.00 left in your account” message.

“The sum of N15 is then deducted from subsequent recharge, making it N115 deductions in total. From that moment on, I can recharge without fear of them removing my money until the next day when I start the ritual all over again.

“And when I complained to their customer care agents, they claimed I must be on a special plan or must have subscribed to a service which is just lies.

“Despite many assurances that the problem would be corrected, it persists. This is sheer exploitation. I just won’t take it”, Robert’s lamented.

Investigations conducted by BH with the help of an IT expert suggested that the hidden charges are cleverly inserted into service subscription messages sent to subscribers by Airtel and unwittingly overlooked by customers, which later comes back to haunt them.

Subscribers often receive free caller tunes, videos or other product valid only for a day, a week, or as stated, after which weekly charges will apply. However, they failed to grasp the implication of the Greek gift as most people don’t critically digest the message well. It starts by offering the gift free of charge for a duration, to be automatically renewed at the end of that stipulated time. A customer is advised to send ‘UNSUBSCRIBE’ to a number to discontinue if he does not want the service extended. What this implies is that if a subscriber fails to unsubscribe immediately or before the given date, it will auto-renew by itself even without his prompting at the expiration of the trial period.

BH was able to obtain one of such text messages from a subscriber. It stated: ‘You have won free ONMOBILE CRBT valid for one week only. Subsequent SUBSCRIPTION of N100 service applies. Please reply: 3 to Reject or DISCONTINUE’.

Another allegation levelled against the carrier is that it charges subscribers for failed text messages. A subscriber who complained to BH of the excesses of Airtel, deliberately sent a text to a wrong and incomplete number in other to justify his claims. He promptly got an automated reply that the message failed. However, his account was debited.

An IT specialist, Ejiro Berkley, told our correspondent that the process of making a call and sending text messages are the same and that the same conditions should apply.

“If you are making a call and mistakenly input a wrong number, you will get a prompting that you have entered a wrong number. Since the call did no go through, you ordinarily won’t be charged for it. The same should apply to SMS. But the situation is different in this clime. Not only Airtel is guilty of this crime, but all the other players are also guilty as well”, she declared.

Another area the company reap off its subscribers is through sending ‘delivery failed’, even though the messages tagged failed had been delivered. According to some aggrieved subscribers, they most time resend the message several times thinking it had failed, not knowing that it was delivered. Curiously, subscribers are charged for all the supposedly failed messages.

A subscriber of Airtel, Toluwani Ibidapo, shared his experience on the issue with BH. “My boss once called me to text the phone number of one of our clients to him. I promptly did that and received a failed message delivery. I kept trying and trying, up to thirty times without any success. Alarmed, I quickly called by my temperamental boss to let him know why he had not seen the text message and to possibly dictate the phone number to him on phone.

“Unfortunately, he must have dropped his phone somewhere as he didn’t pick his calls. Agitated, I kept resending the message in other to avoid my boss’s anger. You know what? He called me back twenty minutes later demanding to know why I wanted to kill his phone battery.

“Perplexed, I said I didn’t understand what he meant. He then told me he received the same text messages from me more than fifty times. I had to apologise, blaming it on my network provider. And the irony of it is that I was charged for all the text messages their computer told me had failed”, she said.

Reacting, the Head, Public Relation, Airtel Nigeria, Erhumu Bayagbon, assured aggrieved subscribers that the company will investigate the allegations with the aim to amicably resolving them. He, however, maintained that the tariff charged for SMS by Airtel tariff is N4 which has not changed.

“Be assured that where there is a perceived or seeming case of overbilling or unsanctioned charge, we will diligently investigate and engage a customer with facts and resolve”, Bayagbon assured.