Now I've never been a big fan of the name-and-shame game, but I thought this deserved attention, as such blatant ignorance, discourtesy and miscommunication is unacceptable. Customer service is tops these days. As a brand, considering the boom of social media and the birth of the humble blog, one slip up is all it takes to send your business into disarray. Ask Woolworths. Ask Nestle. Now ask OpenWeb. Read on.
16th July 2011
Subject: Re: Internet is down.
Hi OpenWeb,
Please look into my account and get back to me. Telkom has reset the
ports and the ADSL syncs so it’s not a problem on their side. You can
reach me on **********.
Many thanks,
________________________________________________________________________________
19th July 2011
Subject: Re: Internet is down.
Hi OpenWeb,
I've been given a new account with a new username because the altech network was down over the weekend and we had no Internet. However, this new account is barely usable, I can't browse let-alone stream anything.
I've sms'd the support number and had no reply. I've been struggling for days and Telkom just resets the ports and says the line is fine. This is the last complaint I'm sending. If it too remains unanswered you can expect me to be cancelling my account moving forward.
________________________________________________________________________________
19th July 2011
Subject: Re: Re: Internet is down.
Hello,
I appreciate your email!
Your account will expire at the end of July.
Cancellation reference: 25285x9
Kind regards,
Founder,
OpenWeb.co.za
________________________________________________________________________________
20th July 2011
Thank you for the below - I find it very telling that you're more willing to cancel a customer than provide one with the service that they are paying for.
You can expect my above email and your response to be present anywhere online where uncapped ADSL is being debated including social networks.
Disappointed Regards,
________________________________________________________________________________
20th July 2011
Hello,
You request a service to be cancelled. I honour this, waive the 30 days notice, and now you want to bad mouth us publicly?
Kind regards,
Founder,
OpenWeb.co.za
________________________________________________________________________________
20th July 2011
Please review the conversation. I requested our service be sorted or EXPECT a cancellation. You then cancelled me.
________________________________________________________________________________
20th July 2011
So you are saying, you request a cancellation twice, once with Dane and once with me, and now I am fabricating this?
Kind regards,
Founder,
OpenWeb.co.za
________________________________________________________________________________
Please review the ENTIRE conversation email thread below. The bold section in the below email is the ONLY time I discussed cancelling ONLY IF MY SERVICE AND COMPLAINTS WERE NOT ADDRESSED.
"Hi OpenWeb,
I've been given a new account with a new username because the altech network was down over the weekend and we had no Internet. However, this new account is barely usable, I can't browse let-alone stream anything.
I've sms'd the support number and had no reply. I've been struggling for days and Telkom just resets the ports and says the line is fine. This is the last complaint I'm sending. If it too remains unanswered you can expect me to be cancelling my account moving forward."
________________________________________________________________________________
20th July 2011
I find the capitals in the below text extremely rude.
Please refrain from shouting at me when I am trying to assist.
Kind regards,
Founder,
OpenWeb.co.za
________________________________________________________________________________
On 20 July 2011
I find this entire email thread to be confusing and disjointed as if my complaints are being handled by different people that aren't reading the full communications.
Attached is a word document with every communication in date stamp order and comments at appropriate parts.
Please point out to me the time and date at which i requested my service be cancelled?
On 20 July 2011
I thought someone was trying to assist me, why is there now silence when I ask for things to be clarified?
Openweb consultants were quick to reply with snarky remarks below, when they hadn't read the full email thread, but when I ask for my alleged cancellation request to be shown to me - now there is no response for over 8 hours.
And that's that. Have your say in the feedback section below.
That's a #Fail on the side of OpenWeb, and well, if that's the way things are there, I'm surprised there's no one else that's had these issues.
ReplyDeleteThey most probably did experience these issues. It's highly likely that they had no Internet to blog about it though ;)
ReplyDeleteThey seem very much aware of their lack of service.
ReplyDeleteThat's possibly the most worrying part, Dave.
ReplyDeleteOrganisations should learn that ignoring the problem won't work in the social sphere. The potential for viral dissemination is way to likely to risk ignoring customers.
Rather respond honestly and concisely. Show transparency and you will accomplish exactly what things like Twitter, FB and blogs are for in the first place: building relationships with your clientele; the end goal being retention, ROI, etc.
Ummm...maybe not understanding the English??? That is shocking!!
ReplyDeleteCan anyone say retard!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteYou ask for the acocunt to cancelled and then freak when it is bwhahaha
you ask for the account to be cancelled and then when it is you freak bwhahahahaha
ReplyDeleteOpenweb should be glad to get rid of such an absolute retard, ass , dumbass etc.
Cancel my account good sir
WTF you just cancelled my account now i am going to bad mouth openweb because i am slightly retarded and totally brain dead bwhahahaha
I'd guess the last 2 comments where made by employees of OpenWeb!?!
ReplyDeleteNope myBB user.
ReplyDeleteJust thought i would comment on what see as a jackass having a fanny wobble then crying on the internet like some little 12 year old.
Sad really.
The sad thing is if you had been slightly nicer and not so arrogant and rude you could easily have resolved your problem.
ReplyDeleteI must agree with the above jackass comment.
What a chop
ReplyDeleteThere's no question that OpenWeb are in the wrong here. Blatantly!
ReplyDeleteWhere's the email to Dane?
ReplyDeleteYa it seems you requested the service to be cancelled twice so why is there missing email?
ReplyDeleteNick frost in the 3rd person, is that a jack rip off from will and grace?
I've been using Openweb for the last 9 months or so and the service received from them has been nothing short of exemplary.
ReplyDeleteI agree, though, that Keoma can be quite a petulant prat at times but not before he has bent over backwards to accommodate and appease a customer.
What a sad blog! You post the biggest load of rubbish on MYBB, and now on some stupid blog! I have been with Ow for around 2 years now and have only had the best service!
ReplyDeleteI don't think it's legal for OpenWeb to cancel someone's account without their consent. It seems the customer was frustrated by the lack of service and thought a cancellation threat will give him/her results. Instead OpenWeb seems to have enough customers and don't mind losing business, this just because the support staff member took offence to the threat or didn't understand that it was a threat.
ReplyDeleteWell when you threaten to cancel twice you may well find your account will be cancelled
ReplyDeleteFirstly, I'm not in any way connect to the complainant or OpenWeb. Just want to be clear about that up front.
ReplyDeleteRight off the bat I'd say the ISP has not dealt with this in a professional manner. I don't think it's malicious, but rather incompetence which has now reached silly proportions.
That said, I also think the complainant is being slightly misleading by not posting all the correspondence. I'm not saying she's in the wrong, but clearly there's communication we're missing out.
Even if the complainant was being rude or unreasonable, this should serve as a reminder to OpenWeb that it should be the bigger man, and rather try and come out clean.
the complainant clearly states
ReplyDelete"Openweb consultants were quick to reply with snarky remarks below, when they hadn't read the full email thread, but when I ask for my alleged cancellation request to be shown to me - now there is no response for over 8 hours."
I don't think there is a missing any correspondence - Openweb dropped the ball on customer service, were very rude and now cannot back up their actions!!
I too am not affiliated to either party.
Good job Nick.
ReplyDeletePity about the incorrigible nature of a number of these meandering observers comments though.
Can't satisfy them all though can we?
:)
Questionable actions from your side,this correspondence only serves to put you in a negative light. Erudite child.
ReplyDeleteNo i'm not an employee nor do I use their service or know them personally. I read the correspondence and came to the realization you received exactly what you should have - a swift kick in the shin to get you to bother another ISP
Hi ... I'm the person this happened to \:D/
ReplyDeleteHi there ... Nic blogged about this as a way of helping me out. I'm the person that this happened to and received these emails from Openweb.
To address the criticisms:
- there are NO EMAILS MISSING ... all are posted in the order in which I received them. I even mention towards the end that the whole conversation is disjointed and hard to understand from my end even, and it feels like separate people are replying under the same address with the same email signature referring to themselves as Keoma. I would never alter the conversation as this would make me liable for a law suit of epic proportions, everything is verbatim as it was stated to me. That's why i'm so shocked and making such a stink about it. I'm seriously just as confused as you guys are as to the gaps in logic and communication.
- In the past I've suspected that multiple consultants respond as Keoma, as I've been an Openweb customer for four years now and had various email conversations with this "Keoma" persona that are written in completely different grammar and styles. Some are definitely more helpful than others, and as you've all seen - some are just downright rude.
- I didn't at any point cancel ... I had not had a response to my emails or sms support requests that I started sending from the 14th of July (when my account - not line - first went down and stayed down for three days). By the 20th of July I threatened that if noone responded to my requests for support then they could EXPECT a cancellation. To which I received a cancellation reference. I don't think in any way this can be defended by Openweb or for them. There is never an excuse for just cutting a client out rather than providing the support and service they pay for.
I really respect everyone's feedback though, I'm sure that not everyone has had bad experiences with Openweb. But I do feel that my experience is quite indicative of what their overall philosophy is. I tried to post complaints on their facebook page (always in polite language and without crudeness) and I got deleted and banned. Today I see they've removed the ability for customers to post on the page at all (other than to reply to Openweb posts), much like what std bank did when they didn't want to respond to customer service complaints.
So you sorted things out with openweb, why haven't you indicated this?
ReplyDeleteYou seemed more than happy on the forums yet you have not mentioned anything about openweb sorting the issue out yet.
See OpenWeb's response to souljo here: (http://tinyurl.com/3s36cxh). Thanks for the feedback guys!
ReplyDeleteI must say if you can, stay away from OpenWeb as an ISP. There service is really astonishingly bad, they aren't equipped to handle customers, let alone provide a service. They treat you as if you are a complete idiot and don't believe that they could ever be in the wrong. so if you wish to struggle with your ISP and suffer for the entire time you are connected, then go OpenWeb's way. If you don't, rather find a more established ISP.
ReplyDeleteOpen web has been using VB accounts for some time now and its utterly useless
ReplyDelete