Vodafone moves in
February 27th, 2010 at 8:35 am by David FarrarThe Herald reports:
Vodafone will today announce a fresh offensive to capitalise on Telecom’s ongoing woes.
Paul Brislen, Vodafone spokesman, said the company would refund any Telecom customers penalised for switching mobile phone providers.
Under the deal to be announced this morning, angry Telecom customers can change to Vodafone and keep the same phone number – and be credited the amount they are charged for breaking their contract.
That amount varies but in one case, Mr Brislen said, a customer had to pay $1500 to leave Telecom.
The aggressive attempt to snatch business and consumer customers comes as Telecom faced more problems yesterday.
The cost of these outages to Telecom must be well into the tens of millions of dollars when you consider the compensation, the lost customers, the scaring off of future customers, the damage to Telecom’s reputation which may affect stuff such as the fibre to the home rollout etc etc.
I speculated on radio yesterday that while the focus for now is on fixing the faults, and not finger pointing, there must be a reasonable chance in the future of a law suit between Telecom and Alcatel-Lucent. Obviously it all depends on the contractual arrangements, but when companies lose so much money due to technical failures, there tend to be fallout.
How big could any lawsuit be? I don’t think one could rule out $100 million or so.
Related posts:
- Telecom v Vodafone data roaming prices
- Vodafone quality
- The Vodafone brand
- Vodafone and Telecom settle
February 27th, 2010 at 8:46 am
does anyone remember the cartoon with the mouse caught in a trap with other mice lined up to shaft it .. the mouse in the trap is Telecom and it had better get the KY out.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 8:53 am
The problem with contracts is that customers are so locked in that they do not have choice. That is why I prefer 2degrees – as well as cheaper rates, by contact is only until the end of today – they give me choice. All customers are doing if they change from Telecom to Vodafone is locking themselves into longer contracts.
Out of Pan into fire.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 9:04 am
Telecom has had some issues for sure, Doh to me… For sure they have….
Let us not assume that Vodafone is oh so much better….. Our company, a decent size user moved to XT, it has had its problems for sure, but sheesh when it is going, it is way better than Vodafone…
The way I see it is I drive from Nothcote Point to Franklin daily…. I cant have a phone call from Home to Franklin on Vodafone! The call will cut out on the harbour bridge, will cut out between prior to the Takanini hill on the Motorway…. So until Vodafone can ensure I can make a call the length of our LARGEST cities motorway, they will not get my business…..
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 9:05 am
Telecom are in serious trouble here. It’s not just the mobile business trauma or the embarrassing 111 emergency line failures.
The govt is about to tender for rolling out fibre across parts of NZ. This repeated catastrophic failure of their network would give no confidence to the Ministry of Economic Development.
The irony is, had Telecom separated into three separate companies a few years back as some pro-regulators suggested, it would have cauterised itself from this PR and operational mess.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 9:13 am
Whafe
If you are driving cutting out on a motorway is irrelevant.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 9:17 am
kiki, you saying it is not possible to drive and make a call?
There are things called phone car kits, have you heard of them?
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 9:21 am
only 100 million?
I see this as one of those company defining cock ups that will plague TC for a decade or so, maybe add another zero.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 9:28 am
With my comments above, I am not at all disagreeing that Telecom is in a world of shit…… And would say the depth is deep deep.
Alcatel will be hoping they are bankrupt, because am sure they will be after Telecom finishes with them
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 9:39 am
I have only one word of advice for those considering Vodafone: don’t.
The phone always cuts out just as you are getting to yes!
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 9:57 am
Let the market punishes Telecom for its fuckups & incompetent (that’s how its supposed to be), but don’t let fucking politicians try to tell a private company of what they can or can’t do in running their business.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 10:40 am
Ya gotta larrrfff at the fellow who says ‘Geeez, this is great! When it’s working…………’
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 11:29 am
if youre thinking of switching to vodafone and live on the north shore – dont do it.
i stopped using my phone as a freakin phone. all i could do was txt. i live in milford, work in albany. it would drop out 4 times in that 10 min journey.
they are beyond awful.
i can live with an outtage or two compared to that.
since the switch, my phone dropped out once, about an hour out of qtown.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 12:02 pm
I haven’t been with Telecom for many years. I tried Vodafone/iHug for a short time (started with iHug and they got bought by Vodafone), but I was NOT happy with the service and the coverage, and that was just for regular phone and internet. So now I am back with TelstraClear for the regular phone and internet. As for cellphone, I think I shall tread carefully.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 12:32 pm
I have friends that wrk in the buildings surrounding Vodafone’s head office down the waterfront and they have no coverage, that is so so amusing….
Jumping shit to Vodafone will not save everyone like Vodafone would have you believe..
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 12:41 pm
Nice Freudian slip? “Jumping shit”?
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 1:29 pm
Changed suppliers recently and have to say that Vodaphone sucks. Drop outs in the middle of Mt Maunganui, sent someone elses phone to start with 3 weeks to sort out. Wouldn’t go there again.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 4:03 pm
Telecom have got caught out under investing in all of their divisions. I think Sir Bob Jones has got something to say about it which is worth the read.http://www.in-business.co.nz/my-deathwish-list/
Vote:This article was written on 17th January 2010 well before the recent events.
Why would any government spend bucks on a New Broadband system with Telecom they even give cowboys a bad name
February 27th, 2010 at 4:33 pm
I’m not sure I’d write the incidents of late off to technical problems. I think most of the gear Alcatel Lucent have installed fundementally works – for example, in other countries – and the problems relate to how they were installed. The architecture of the system is what I think is really at fault here. That opens up some interesting questions. For example, did Telecom screw Alcatel-Lucent down so much that they had to put in a shoe-string architecture rather than a robust, reliable one? If that were the case then I’m not sure what recall Telecom would actually have. At the end of the day the buck stops with Telecom, how they manage and relate with their suppliers should not be a matter for public scrutiny. I don’t like the fact that Telecom have pointed at least part of the blame onto a supplier – they are responsible for XT.
Vote:February 27th, 2010 at 5:52 pm
I walked past the Voda shop in the mall today. One sales person, one customer. I expected the Telecom shop to be empty. It wasn’t – 5 sales people, 8 customers. Vodafone is welcome to the hysterical customers I suppose.
Vote:February 28th, 2010 at 9:40 am
After ten years of continual frustration with the Vodafone system giving us patchy coverage we reached the point of desperation and switched our two Vodafone accounts(2x I-Phones) to Telecom. We live in rural Franklin. Vodafone had made hollow promises of improved covarage since the early nineties but never delivered.
Vote:Since changing to Telecom we have had excellent coverage and no longer have to stand in a special place outside, in the garden, facing mecca on one leg to get coverage.
We are using the phones much more now, balancing our land line and cell phone useage.
To all those considering switching to Vodafone-remember the colour of the grass on the other side of the fence is not always greener. You may regret changing.
February 28th, 2010 at 11:29 pm
I’m with Warfe.
As a long time Vodafone customer I couldn’t possibly count the number of times calls fail, their 3G network is AWOL and often even the old one is not present. That’s before one has to go into battle to get through to their ‘help’ desk.
It’s a bit rich the way they are laying it on about the number of customers jumping ship from Telecom. IF any are then may God help them.
Vote:March 1st, 2010 at 12:30 pm
moved to 022 at xmas time – consistent service with no outages.
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