Sep 27, 2002 11:52 AM
4644 Views
(Updated Dec 05, 2002 09:09 PM)
Dear People,
Well being honest to my review there has been a few more developments in my turbulent relationship with Touchtel...
After all the trouble I had put forth below, well I finally got rid of my connection a few days ago. Good riddance is all I can say. After the initial teething troubles, I did use the connection at peace, or so I thought. Then came stories of one more wrong bill and something called an outgoing call bar. Or in Touchtel lingo an ''OG Bar''. No thats not a hip pub but what they do to people who dont pay their bills on time.
These guys are very prompt at implementing the OG bar, but pay your blls and it will take forever to correct it. I actually had to wait for ten days once to get the Bar removed. It was pathetic, they didnt have any record that I had paid my bills.
Finally once I turned up at a Franchisee outlet to pay another bill, and the lady was actually in tears handling customer complaints, a guy cancelled his connection right in front of me. She was telling me how I would get my connection restored when Providence thought so, and that the actual Touchtel thing was in a mess. They had started services without basic infrastructure even.
I even had an actual employee tell me how the whole setup stinks inside. Finally a week or so back I decided to shift my house. Even then the franchisee told me that as much as they have been told to say that the phone will get shifted in 5 days it may actually take a lot more time, she said, ''These things happen sir, you will have to live with that....'' Talk about customer being king, king of fools I would say....
And after faxing across a request for transfer, I finally had an engineer who came along and put on airs as if he was Sunil Mittal himself, or Graham Bell or whatever. How he acted was a joke and would take a whole review in itself. He gave me some eyewash about not wiring being difficult in the new house and that they would rather cancel than ''go against their norms of connection''.
It was clear they had no intention of spending money to transfer my phone. They dont want customers like you and me, all they want are corporate customers, (again something an employee told me.)
I cancelled the phone. I have not done this on any review before, but STAY AWAY. DO NOT HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH TOUCHTEL. AIRTEL MAY BE GREAT BUT TOUCHTEL ABSOLUTELY STINKS. THEY HAVE NO IDEA OF WHAT TO DO ABOUT ANYTHING, THEIR EMPLOYEES FROM TOP TO BOTTOM ARE INCOMPETENT AND RUDE. FOR GOODNESS' SAKE GO FOR SOMEBODY ELSE. THIS JUST IS NOT WORTH YOUR INVESTMENT. I HAVE LEARNT THAT THE HARD WAY.
At the end of the review I had told you to think twice, please don't.........
(I have removed a letter I wrote to Touchtel from below, because it went over the word limit....)
I get very passionate whenever somebody asks me about Bharti and their fixed line service Touchtel. I paste below a copy of the letter I wrote to a newspaper here, and to their customer service a couple of months or so ago when I was at my wits end. I did get my phone finally a week or so after I sent this letter. (Though not because of the letter I am sure)
I mean this to be a warning to all people out there looking to get telephone connections from the widely advertised private telephone services provider in Chennai. Putting into words what I have gone through the last few weeks or so is painful, and would sell briskly as a paperback. I can broadly classify their incompetency in a number of sectors:
The knowledge the employees have in their franchisee outlets is abominable, for each question I ask, all they do is politely give you a copy of their brochure. The know the basics only, i.e. you fill in a form, they tell you by default that it will take 10 to 15 days. Of course they do make a big show of going through some sort of database to see if the piping goes through your area and so on. But basically its is pretty decent eyewash. I was told that my house in Mandaiveli would no problem at all. They had one of those ubiquous blue boxes right next to my building, and it was just a matter of a few days before I would be communicating with the world. I applied for the phone sometime in the third week of June.
After a few days I got a request for a proof of employment, which they wanted, because my billing address was at my office. I was impressed, I was under the impression that things were moving at a very quick pace. Then followed a few calls to the office to confirm my address and details, and a visit from a gentleman to my office to confirm the same. After a few days I was getting a little worried, it was past the 15 days limit set by the person at the franchisee office. Then on the 14th of July a person from the company came along to get a power connection to drill holes for the distribution box. He also mentioned that the phone would be at home the same day evening. Nothing happened. When they finished drilling, they packed up their bags and left.
No news of anything for a few days. On the 17th of July I
had a stationary and a lifeless phone.
Now a week or so (Aug. 2) after the letter had been despatched I did get my phone live. Things did not stop there though. A few days later I had my outgoing calls disabled. I kept getting a recorded message that I had not paid my bills. Which drove me wild, and then I made a few more phone calls when I found out that they had forgot to revoke my old rogue bill and their system had disabled my phone because, well, as per their records I had not paid a bill, which I was billed wrongly in the first place!!! And after many days of bickering I finally got that rectified as well. Of course the customer service person did say that she had done it on personal risk, and requested me to pay up the bills as soon as possible.
Now I guess things have finally settled down. But it will be really unfair if I dont give credit where it is due. The actual service is really good. They have an voice mail service that is really useful and comes with the connection. They also provide an ISP connection, which is fast and very very reliable. I did have a small instrument fault which was quickly rectified as well. It has been a pleasure using the service. But that does not explain all the birth agony though.
I suppose the service is actually top class, and value for money. But their system of customer handling.... well you have read it above yourself. I also think mine was a case which went totally awry from the beginning, and have got positive feedback from other people who have taken up a Touchtel connection. All I can say is think twice......
