Cellphone numbers have become appendages in our world. In the Philippines almost everyone has one or even two, We have 3G and 2G phones in abundance and soon we will have LTE phones. Some of us panic when we dont have our phones and not surprisingly some of us do not. Everyday we are bombarded with commercials, promos and raffles offering cellphones and their services. So in a country such as our it should not be difficult to have a cellphone line to be transferred, right?
From what I experienced from PLDT Alpha Enterprise which handled my company’s Smart mobile phone account unfortunately this was not to be so. I left the company I worked for earlier this year and I requested that my cellphone would be transferred to me. I was told thi was possible and I filled up the necessary forms and it seemed it was fix. I was relieved because years before I had difficulty re-transferring my old phone line from another telco Globe, at least this was different.
After two months passed, no billing from Smart came. A check at the local Smart Center informed that the cellphone was still being billed at my office. So I sent an email to my former office to inquire whether the transfer happened. It would seem that the transfer was not made. And on that day an account officeer from Alpha Enterprise advised me to fill out another form and they promptly sent me via email the form. In the email they advised me that they would have the form picked up and I gave them my home address.
But no one came for the document. I allowed a week pass before I sent an email asking them to pick the documents up. They were apologetic but still no one came for the document. In the end I had to pay and send the document to their office.
Then I got message about my billing. I promptly emailed asking them about this. And requested them to send me a copy of the bills and to cross-check them because my former company could have paid for it. Their customer officer called me and asked me to pay the minimum. But they could not produce the bills, not even a scan copy of the bill or a breakdown via email. In the meantime I was about to go on a trip and again requested them to send at least copies of the bills by email. Nothing.
Instead, when I returned from my trip after three weeks I was informed by my former office via an email addressed to PLDT Alpha Enterprise that they received a demand letter and disconnection notice. This was just too much.
First, for some unknown reason they were not able to process my documents nor contacted me.
Second, Having provided the documents for a second time. They fail to pick it up and I had to pay to have the documents be brought to their office. And despite this they were not able to process it.
Third, A simple request of the bills could not be furnished.
So much for their Alpha Enterprise team motto – Relationship First.
Thus it was no surprise that my last email to them was that I was withdrawing my application and again reiterating my request that copy of the bills be furnished, which they acknowledge. In the email I told them I was not interested in complaining to my former company nor posting this incident and hope they would learn from it.
A week after I got another email from my former company including me in the email sent to Alpha Enterprises again detailing the problem. It was at this point I decided to write this post. And I have decided to pay the last amount sent to me via SMS without the benefit of seeing a copy of the bills.
In retrospect, Perhaps I should have done a number of things use social media and contacts to bring about a resolution to this. But part of me wanted to see how this would fare as a regular customer. And this is Alpha Enterprise were relationship comes first. One learns the hard way I guess.
In the end I just went to the neighborhood mall and bought a pre-paid sim from Smart. It took less than thirty minutes.
If this is the customer relationship of Smart via Alpha Enterprise I shudder to think and hope this is not the norm.
