Ever since I got my Vodafone account I’ve been missing phone calls.

I’d be on the phone to someone, I’d finish the call and then I’d get two or three Spinvoxes arrive.

The realisation that people had been trying to call me whilst I nattered away was quite unnerving. I eventually did the equivalent of a Homer Simpson ‘Duh’ — Call Waiting wasn’t enabled by default.

It took me another month or so of occasional ‘errrs’ in my mind to do a Google search and find the code to enable Call Waiting on the Vodafone UK network.

It is, in case you were wondering, *43#. Then #43# to disable. More details here.

Surely Call Waiting is a service that everyone would want activated immediately? No?

On that page on Vodafone’s site, there is, inexplicably (to me, anyway), a picture of a guy scratching his head (top right) and a portrait photo of some middle aged chap do a mild mannered smile at me — unusual branding…

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Martin over at Wireless Moves has been nailed for half a day without data access in Germany recently. His mistake? To use Vodafone Germany.

Have a read of his experience:

I am on the road quite often and, as most of you have figured out in the meantime, a heavy user of 3G networks for Internet access. While I generally like the experience some network outages like this two and a half day nationwide full Internet access blackout in the Vodafone Germany network recently sends shivers down my spine.

After all, we are not talking about a third class operator but one that claims to be a technology leader in the sector. As I use Vodafone Internet access a lot I was glad I was only impacted for half a day, having been in a DSL save haven for the rest of the time. If I had been on the road, however, this would have been a major disaster for me.

I would go absolutely nuts, ABSOLUTELY NUTS. I’d go spare. I don’t know how I’d handle this, at all, other than rage, fury and massive, massive annoyance.

My issue wouldn’t be lack of data access. I’ve got a 3UK USB modem courtesy of the 3mobilebuzz team and an older 3UK usb modem. I could use WalkingHotspot, or copious amounts of WiFi, or actually, use my phone to get connected.

My issue is the professional abilities of Vodafone Germany’s Chief Technology Officer and his (or her) team.

Talking frankly: How shit do you have to be to let your data network go down? Obviously an outage in one small area, well, that’s an arse. But an outage across the COUNTRY? Unthinkable.

An outage ACROSS THE COUNTRY for TWENTY FOUR HOURS? Surely you’ve got to start giving money back to customers.

But an outage for 48 hours? That’s an utter shambles. A total and utter shambles. Where’s the resillience?

Forget that, where are the smart teams of people fixing it so that an initial outage doesn’t turn into a day or more? To allow a data outage to last longer than a full day, what kind of rubbish do you have to be smoking?

You’ve got an unlimited budget and the ear of every single Chief Executive of every single technology services firm in Germany ready to help you fix the outage. You need a Cisco engineer? Here, have one. It’ll cost you £5k for the day. Who cares. You need a team of 24? Fine. They’ll be there in 30 minutes. You need spare capacity? You can buy it from Deutsche for some ludicrous sum. Done. Fix it, fix it, fix it.

Data isn’t a poor third cousin. It’s a critical network service and when your infrastructure is that piss-poor and when your management is that inept to allow it to continue, well, you’re no longer a network.

100% ridiculous.

Anyway, I assume it’s back and working now.

You can read the report in the Handeslblatt here. (The link is a Google translation into English)

Ahhhh. That’s it. I’m feeling it now, from Vodafone! A feeling of control, of might, of domination! The Master of the Universe is back. It’s about time.

The sleeping Big Red has woken up and snapped up Alltel, America’s 5th largest mobile operator with 13 million customers across 34 states.

Commenting on the Transaction, Arun Sarin, Chief Executive of Vodafone, said:
“We expect the acquisition of Alltel to significantly increase the value of our 45% interest in VZW
through the realisation of substantial in-market synergies and to reinforce its leading position in the
world’s largest mobile market by revenues. Whilst VZW’s free cash flows will initially be deployed in
reducing net debt, the VZW Board has agreed to conduct an annual dividend review process and
to the payment of enhanced tax distributions.”

Key highlights

Anticipated benefits of the Transaction include:

- Reinforces VZW’s position as the leading mobile operator in the US market with 80 million
customers and pro-forma CY2007 revenues of US$52.7 billion
- NPV of cost and capex synergies expected at over US$9.0 billion, after integration costs.
Significant value creation arises from the in-market nature of the transaction. Annual run-
rate of synergies of US$1.5–1.7 billion by CY2011

Every time I think of the money I’ve spunked using data on Vodafone UK, my heart races faster.

Throughout the weekend and early this week, I’ve been saying to myself, ‘What’s changed? Here we are, 2008 and I’m *still* being nailed for data on a per megabyte basis?’

Then I thought back to the chump-campaign we ran for SMS Text News (where I routinely referred to any o2 customer I met as a ‘chump’ for putting up with their per meg pricing). Per meg data pricing wasn’t an issue at this point last year as I was using both T-Mobile and 3 and enjoying their unlimited data policies.

In April I was on their 7.50 ‘120mb unlimited’ data plan. The key point with this plan being that if you go over 120mb, you get nailed to the wall for 2.35 plus VAT. This from the alleged market leader. Ridiculous, I hear you say. HAHA, I hear the 3UK customers yell.

The problem here isn’t Vodafone. It’s me, not quite understanding how things work. I restricted my usage. This annoyed me, but I worked hard at not using much data at all. Then things got out of hand and I slipped up toward the end of the month of April. I was at the Internet World conference and wanted to use QIK to do some video recording. I tried desperately to log on to their wireless internet. Anything to avoid using my Vodafone data connection. I eventually had no choice, alas. If I wanted to do streaming video for the teeming masses of SMS Text News readers watching online, then I needed to use Vodafone. Much as it pained me. I just hoped I wasn’t going over the 120mb limit. Now and again, I had to think to myself, ‘What the hell is wrong with you?’ I purchased Vodafone service for a reason — reliability being the chief reason. But I think I also thought that, if I did go over that 120mb limit, well, … you know.. it’s fair use, right?

No.

It was in the terms and conditions. I’m pretty confident I couldn’t bring myself to examine the 120mb price plan terms and conditions in detail. It would have been far too depressing and a reminder to me that, as much as I wanted Vodafone to live up to it’s we-are-a-data-leader reputation (just look at the amount of space-age USB modem advertising around the country), the reality was far, far, FAR from the truth. Or, actually, that their price plan geniuses were just that: Ultra smart bastards. If I looked to closely, I’d recognise that that the emperor did have clothes. And they were the finest in the kingdom, because of what I was agreeing to pay.

So we move on.

Where are we today? Well, Jakub of Vodafone UK PR called me to explain that when Vodafone announced that all new price plans include 500mb of data, they made a big switch. Here’s the science bit: Previously, the data bundle was 120mb. Anything over this amount was billable. The new bundle has a fair use policy of 500mb. That’s the important bit — fair use. That is, if you go over that amount, no one’s going to shoot you and, crucially, no one’s going to whack you for data charges.

If you exceed the 500mb, chances are, no one from Vodafone will come knocking with baseball bats. If you are consistently using 2GB a month, you can expect some communication from Vodafone to ask you to reduce your usage. I then imagine if you continue, they’ll switch you on to a per-meg mobile broadband tariff.

So. The key difference is fair usage. Why did they set it at 500mb?

Well, I asked Jakub for a direct quote:

We know that our customers enjoy accessing social networks and use email on their mobile so we wanted to make things easier for them. Our statistics show that social networks are amongst the top five most searched for on mobile internet for example so embedding data charges into price plans and raising the bar on data downloads is a logical development allowing even more customers to enjoy mobile internet when around and about. The new price plans give Vodafone customers greater confidence to access their favorite social network or e-bay because they no longer need to worry about how much data they download and they know exactly how much they will pay at the end of the month.

This value does serve to highlight a gulf between Vodafone and its competitors. Obviously most people won’t use anywhere near this amount of data per month. Some will. If you’re a heavy data user (from your handset), should you still be with Vodafone?

Yes. I reckon. I’m sticking with them. Once I understood the fair usage viewpoint, I was a lot more content.

Phew.

ONE IMPORTANT POINT: In order to qualify for the 500mb fair use agreement, do phone up customer services and make sure it’s activated on your account. I think I’m on an older price plan that doesn’t automatically have it included (all new ones do). I’m going to call CS and check as I’m still paying 7.50/month on top of my existing tariff.

I’m going to use my Vodafone N90 with abandon now (i.e. without limiting myself to one or two photo uploads a day and so on) and see what my average usage is going to be at the end of the month. It was near 700 or 800mb with T-Mobile and 3 in the past.

This Friday morning I’m interviewing Jane Hext, Director of Vodafone UK’s Customer Services about all sorts of things. I’m going to ask her about the Forum Intervention Team (both, from the perspective of going out online and reacting to customers) and the company’s own eForum on their site. I’m keen to understand more how the feedback from these teams passes back into the company.

I’d also like to get her perspective of what it’s like managing CS for such a big operation: What challenges they face, for example, and how they keep their teams motivated and efficient.

If you have a question you’d like me to put to Jane, email me it and I’ll do my best to put it to her on Friday.

This is what I was busy writing when I got a call from Jakub, Vodafone spokesperson…

£1,120 to buy me out of my existing contract commitment with Vodafone. I just called their terminations line to establish how it would work. The lady, to her credit, did her best to try and win me over — but she wasn’t able to do anything on data other than 500mb.

So it’s just over a grand to exit from my Vodafone deal. I already paid 20% of that, effectively, in my data charges for April. I’ll do as the terminations lady suggested and wait ’til August — then I can swap my price plan to 20 quid a month and bish, bash, bosh, I can retire the account.

I’ve decided the way ahead. I’m going hunting for a Nokia N95 8GB to use on 3. I’ll sell my E90 — useless on Vodafone if I can’t use it for data purposes properly — and I’ll get a small, simple Nokia business phone to make calls with.

I’ll write up the call in a moment. You might be surprised by the outcome. I was. I missed a fundamental element with the new price plans…

I talked to Lee of the Vodafone Forum Intervention Team (”FIT”). He’s a smart chap - kind, friendly, professional. I went through my issue: That my data usage has been substantially lower than I’d like, that I’ve been intentionally limiting myself.

Lee made the point that, all things being equal, if my usage in April stays the same (roughly 275mb) then I’ll be perfectly fine for May since I now come under the 500mb allowance.

The trouble is, I think I’ve already ramped up my usage since I knew I had a larger allowance.

I can’t go another month of 2.35 + VAT per meg for over usage.

Data on the handset is a critical business requirement for me and it’s surprising that Vodafone, together with their 13 billion of profits haven’t recognised that there is a market for people like me who will pay more for a larger inclusive bundle.

I think the Vodafone strategy is highly focused on the fact that if you want more than 500mb, you’ll pay for it. Why else would they NOT have any other data bundles?

And here I am: A stupid customer, paying 2.35 +VAT per meg for 80 odd meg in April. Goodness knows what the bill will be next month, even allowing for the 500mb increase. Lee suggested I check my usage regularly via the online billing control panel. It’s a helpful comment, however I’m afraid it’s not what I want. I don’t want to have to keep checking. When I do, by the way, the unbilled calls section continually times out:

I discussed with Lee the possibility of using my Vodafone USB dongle’s sim card in a mobile handset for data only (and having another handset for phone calls). I wanted to make sure that was an approved thing to do. It is. He was careful to point out that all calls I make from that data-only SIM will be charged at the full rate. Good point, that. (Incidentally, at 35p/minute, I’d have been able to make almost 630 minutes worth of calls for the 220 pound data charges I had last month.)

I can’t see why I have to do this though.

Why do I have to use TWO phones because Vodafone’s weak, incapable, inpaired and infirm billing system can’t handle it?

Or worse, because some numpty in Vodafone, some head-of-price-plans, has decreed that it’s 500mb on a handset or nothing, goodbye?

It’s simply not good enough. Not from the world’s largest mobile company.

Two choices.

Put up, shut up.

Do something about it.

Well, I’ve got 250,000 of the world’s most influential mobile readers glued to the site. Let’s see what we can do. Your ideas, please?

So, there you have it. I talked to a very helpful Jackie in Vodafone who tells me that in April, I used 275mb of data.

In April, of course, I was on the ‘unlimited’ 120mb data plan. So I was whacked for the cost of 155mb of data at ridiculous rates (totaling an extra 220 pounds).

As of the 1st of May, this inclusive data bundle headed north to 500mb. So, theoretically, provided I keep my data usage highly restricted, I will be fine. I won’t be billed extra.

I’m not sure how to view this.

Yesterday I took four photos on my Vodafone E90 and used ShoZu to upload them to Flickr. That took about 3.5mb of my data allowance. Just sending four photos. Now if I do that daily, that’s 105mb per month. That’s hardly a lot of photos, either.

I’m massively restricting myself when I’m out, you see. I don’t take any photos unless they’re for ‘business purposes’ and even then, I severely restrict what I upload, because of this inhibiting 500mb limit.

I also panic like no tomorrow when I’m using services like QIK. You’ll note that I rarely do more than 2-3 minute videos because of the stupid limitations on Vodafone. The 10 minute interview I did with Adam from Esendex (coming soon) took 32mb. THIRTY TWO MEG. Nothing if you’re on 3 or T-Mobile’s data plans.

Ah. Hold on.

I’ve just realised what I did. Idiot. At the very end of April, I went to Internet World and produced a series of QIK videos from the show. I interviewed a lot of people and must have done, what, 50-60 minutes worth of streaming video (so much so that my battery went flat in that period). A rough fag-packet calculation of 3.2 meg per minute x 60 minutes = 192 meg. There’s your problem.

Or, more specifically, there’s my problem.

How do I respond to this then?

Well, I didn’t go nuts at the kind and efficient Jackie. I could just hear her waiting for me to demand a refund. I could sense she wasn’t looking forward to telling me there was nothing she could do. There isn’t. I signed the contract, I knew the limitations. I’m the idiot who’s using Vodafone for data. I’m responsible for the costs.

I think that’ll do it though.

220 pounds? Ridiculous. Absolutely 100% ridiculous. My fault, obviously. But it’s ridiculous that I was exposed to that. It’s ridiculous that Vodafone can look me in the eye and take that money from me.

I knew this though. I knew it when I signed up.

I can’t simply rely on them not to screw me again. I *need* to use data on my handset (NOT just my USB modem) as it’s part of a requirement for my business. I understand — as Jackie from Customer Services explains — that the 500mb is fine for most people. I am not ‘most people’ though. And Vodafone’s utter, utter, UTTER failure to recognise the subset of their subscriber base who NEED these kinds of services, shouldn’t be rewarded.

I feel a fool — a total fool — for rewarding it and trying to go-with-the-flow. I was doing the worst possible thing you can do in business: Hope. I was living in the hope economy, hoping that if I did use more than my allowance, it’d be gently shrugged off. I was hoping I wouldn’t be billed for every extra byte. I was hoping that Vodafone’s price plan setting chaps recognised that 120mb (and 500mb) are brilliant for normobs but an utter joke for people like me. I was hoping that the Vodafone response would be better than ‘Well, if you use more than 120 or 500mb a month, then you’re clearly a power user and what’s more, you can probably afford it, right?’

Well I can’t afford to take the risk that if I interview someone on QIK or take a few too many photos or use Nimbuzz or Palringo a little too often, I’ll be spunking TWO POUNDS and THIRTY FIVE PENCE (PLUS VAT) per meg over my bundle.

No, it’s absolutely ridiculous.

I am enjoying the audio quality on Vodafone. That’s it though. The data, particularly from my E90 has been abysmal. This is in part because the E90 won’t do 3.5G. But more often than not, when I’m out and about in London, I continually get 2G coverage. Great for audio but piss-poor for data. Now and again the 3G icon will pop up … only to swap back to 2G. Usable for Google, for contact and calendar syncing, or for IM. But shit for QIKing and uploading anything fast. Shit compared to 3 and T-Mobile. Unlike most, I’ve got direct, real time experience of the other networks, every day. I’ve accounts on every network except Orange. I’m not comparing an idealistic grass-is-greener experience. I’m comparing reality. I’ve been putting up with it up until now, but it’s really quite annoying. And now I have to massively limit my usage to avoid being screwed every single month.

What next, then?

Do I dump Vodafone? Jackie from Customer Services has got someone there working on a price-plan review.

“You are on one of our biggest tariffs,” she says.

“Jackie, that’s so I don’t get surprises. 3,000 minutes, unlimited landline calls, that’s so I don’t ever go over it.”

“Ah,” she says. I reckon she was hoping the price-plan analysis person would suggest I drop to a lower voice call tariff. Not if I’m anywhere near in danger of being billed 35p a minute for calling my friends on different networks. No sir-eeee.

“Do you do custom data plans?” I asked. I’m a business customer with Vodafone, so I thought perhaps, there is something they might be able to do.

“How much,” I said, “Would you charge me for a gig of data per month? Or can’t you do that?”

“We can give you 6GB on a USB modem,” she replied.

Yeah. But they can’t or won’t give me anything better than 500mb on a handset. WHO is it that sets this limit? They need their head examined. They really do. I’d pay more. Like 3’s X-Series (1GB) or T-Mobile Web’N'Walk Max (10GB).

Half of me reckons stay with Vodafone and get a Nokia 6500 to make voice calls and get an N95 8GB/N82 on 3UK and use that as my workhorse.

The other half of me says don’t bother rewarding this 500mb limitation and pull my business entirely from Vodafone. And put up a prominent advertisement on SMS Text News telling everyone and anyone not to use Vodafone for data.

Viewpoints?

I’m about to call Vodafone. I’ve got a bit of space in my day dedicated to calling up to see what they say about whacking me for 220 quid’s worth of data. Dear me.

Here’s what I think will happen:

- I get connected to a nice person at customer services
- They look at my account and tell me I used ‘XX’ megs of data.
- I explain I understand this but I can’t tolerate being billed this much for it, not when there are other operators with (arguably better) data services that are priced a lot more sensibly.
- I think at this point, the customer services person will have to do a virtual shrug. I doubt there will be much more they can do.
- If that’s the case, that’s me. I’ll swap right-away to another operator. I don’t think there’s much point in phoning the Vodafone PR team. It’s a company-wide issue, right? There’s hardly much they’ll be able to do for me. I cannot be arsed to wait for them to introduce a higher level data bundle. Not at 220 pounds a month EXTRA.

Pah. Let’s call’em then…

If a The Telegraph report is right, departing CEO Arun Sarin will be replaced by his right hand man Vittorio Colao, latterly head of Vodafone’s European operations.

The Telegraph says Sarin’s departure will be formally revealed at the company’s half yearly results announcement later on today, after five years in charge with the operator. Sarin had a rough time a few years back after shareholders attempted to oust him from the CEO role, but he weathered the storm and has proved a safe pair of hands since.

Under Sarin, Vodafone’s gone deeper into emerging markets, talked up WiMax and mobile advertising, got into broadband and mobile broadband alike, tried to reposition itself in the enterprise market and promised to get speeds of over 20Mbps on its network before long. Can’t wait to find out what Colao’s got in store.

That’s it!

Arun Sarin’s off. Yes, he’s announced that he’s stepping down as CEO of Vodafone.

He’s done a good job, I reckon. He’s been a safe-pair-of-hands and, if I’m honest, a little bit too safe. That said, he’s presided over a period of record profits (£13 billion) and he’s been supervising some pretty nifty acquisitions of late.

It’s a good time to exit though. Big high.

Who’s going to replace him? Well, there’s lots of rumours. One chap ‘close to the situation’ reckons it will be an outsider. Another chap at a competing operator tells me that Big Red’s European CEO, Vittorio Calao is widely tipped.

This is more or less what Lilly Peel, Telecoms Correspondent at The Times is reporting too.

A while ago, if you recall, I swapped from using T-Mobile to Vodafone, for my primary mobile telecommunications needs. It was a big deal for me because I’ve massively disagreed with the operator’s pricing strategy for years. 35 pence per minute to call a friend on another network (out of bundle) is frankly, in this day and age, nothing short of a joke.

12.5 pence per text message, too, (again, out of bundle) is just ridiculous.

But I took the plunge. I needed the confidence of being able to speak to people on my handset reliably. T-Mobile just kept on cutting out.

I got an 18 month contract and a Nokia E90 from Vodafone. What’s more, I loaded up, *big time*, with allowances. I didn’t want massive bill shock. I still remember getting my invoices from years ago when I was originally with Vodafone and trying to figure out how I was using up so much money (hundreds of pounds per month) on something that, really, shouldn’t be that expensive.

My first month’s invoice came and, well, it was pushing 400 pounds. No bother, I thought. Why? Well I was the idiot who ran up a stupid bill calling the UK from America. I mistakenly thought that Vodafone Passport, their much advertised international roaming service, applied to America. America’s a first-world country, right? Surely it’s the same as France. No. 125p or 135p a minute. I can’t quite recall but I blew a good few hundred with that mistake. Fair enough. I should have checked.

My second month’s bill has just arrived electronically. It’s well over 300 quid. Again.

You what?

I’ve got three lines on my Vodafone account. The first two — a Blackberry and a USB modem are fine. 25 quid’s worth between them.

It’s my main account number - the Nokia E90 - that’s ridiculous.

Read this breakdown for that number and weep:

So what are you seeing? First, you’re seeing £68 quid spent on 3,000 minutes to any mobile handset, 500 inclusive texts and unlimited landline calls. I’d need to be a total communications freak to go over this, right?

Then you see the 7.50 mobile data bundle with 500mb inclusive. Then insurance. Then 8 quid’s worth of fooking annoying ‘calls’. Fair enough.

Well, actually, NOT fair enough. That 8 quid is how Vodafone rakes in more cash from you when you call 0800 numbers, 0870 numbers and what not. 8 quid is manageable.

Move your eyes to the final row: Messaging, Mobile Browsing & Data.

One hundred and eighty seven quid? Or 220 quid including VAT.

On what?

I haven’t been using my handset stupidly. I haven’t been sending every single photo I’ve taken to Flickr via ShoZu. I’ve only sent the *relevant* ones. You have to piss about being selective when you’re being restricted to 120mb or 500mb per month inclusive.

James Whatley, regular SMS Text News contributor, assures me that, despite his copious data usage on his Vodafone account, he’s never once been billed more than 7.50/month.

Hmm.

I’ve done some QIK videos. But few and far between. I’ve been incredibly careful (which has really annoyed me. I didn’t bother when I used T-Mobile or Three).

I’m going to call Vodafone’s Customer Services tomorrow and establish exactly what this 220 quid accounts for. I’m pretty sure it’s not text messaging. It’s gotta be sodding data, hasn’t it?

If it’s data and if I’m being charged ridiculous per megabyte fees, I’ll demand a refund. Now I know that I signed the contract etc., etc., but we’re in the year 2008. Half way through it. This kind of billing is entirely unacceptable. I haven’t used the service copiously. And if it’s going to cost me 220 quid in extra charges per month to hardly use the service then, bollocks to that.

I will demand a refund on this 220 quid. Absolutely RIDICULOUS.

Further, I’ll demand 10gb of data per month at a rate of 20 pounds per month. That works for me.

It is, I’m sure you will agree, highly unlikely that customer services will react favourably to this. No bother. I understand their position. But I need to get this out of my system and I want to give them a chance to retain my custom.

I could have bought an N95 8GB on 3UK at 30 odd quid a month and used it for 6 months for the cost of these additional data charges — for one month!

So if I can’t get this resolved tomorrow, then I will swap at 5pm today to another provider.

What’s your perspective?

The LG Secret launches today on Vodafone. With MusicStation. Nice.

This shocked the hell out of me.

I was packed into a tube train on Sunday with thousands of others going to watch the London Marathon. Angus, a friend, was running. Support is the way ahead. I’m told that it’s inspiring to see your friends waving you on — so I was heading to the 11 mile mark to wave at Angus.

Whilst pressed against a hundred other bodies, I did what any self respecting Londoner does: Read the adverts.

I quickly located the T-Mobile one and had a look:

You what?

I had to look twice. Three times, actually.

US & European mobile/landline calls INCLUDED in your minutes?

The race to zero has begun!

It’s such a shock because I can’t even call internationally on my Vodafone account. I haven’t enabled it. You have to enable international calling if you’ve got a new contract. In fact, it’s SO expensive that Vodafone will take a real close look at you, check if you’re wearing new shoes, see if you’ve cleaned your teeth and the like, before deciding on whether to allow you to pay them ridiculous amounts of money to call internationally. I’m actually using RebTel to make my international calls at a whopping 0.8p per minute to the States (good deal, eh?) via an 0207 local London number. That avoids me paying the 135p per minute or whatever it would be, if I had international calls activated on my handset. So this is on extreme.

The other extreme is T-Mobile. Often the leader in market innovation, T-Mobile is now offering businesses (or those with a ‘business’ account), inclusive international calls.

So if you’ve got 1,000 minutes (for 20 quid a month, per line), you could, theoretically, use them to call the States. Or mainland Europe.

I’m assuming that ‘Europe’ means ‘Old Europe’ (as the US Whitehouse liked to call it — France, Germany, Spain). I reckon the more exotic European countries might not be inclusive.

So. Interesting.

That’s the first time I’ve seen a UK operator offering international calls as part of your ‘minutes’ bundle.

Yes, you have to be a ‘business’ customer, I think, in order to qualify, but that is phenomenally good.

It also makes sense. Global economy and all that.

It’s a rather good marketing ploy too. How long before I start staring at my Vodafone-branded Nokia E90 and think that I really am being screwed against the wall with my Vodafone price plan?

I obviously have to then remember the uber-annoyance I felt when my T-Mobile calls kept on hanging up all the time.

Vodafone has announced that it’s struck a five year deal with BT which will see BT’s wholesale arm providing connectivity between Voda’s base stations and its own network. According to the two companies, the deal comes off the back of predicted demand for high bandwidth mobile applications like photo sharing and downloading music.

The deal will see Vodafone linked up to BT’s 21st Century Network-enabled Ethernet service, which the telco says will mean backhaul speeds of up to 60Mbps.

Vodafone isn’t the first telco to get someone else to do the hard graft on backhaul - T-Mobile struck a similar deal with BT a while back - and it probably won’t be the last. If outsourcing backhaul means mobile operators can spend their cash on areas like dreaming up useful new services, boosting bandwidth and improving customer service, it sounds like a win-win situation for everyone involved.

Yes, triple arse. Quadruple arse. Somewhere amongst the bustling morning, I lost my Vodafone branded Nokia E90. Or it was stolen. I don’t quite know. One moment it was in my pocket, another moment it was gone.

What a total arse.

The moment I realised, I got out my 3UK handset and called Vodafone UK. They’ve barred the SIM from making outgoing calls. I rather helpfully put the phone on silent/vibrate so even if it’s lying somewhere (like, for example, in the back of that limo I was in this morning), it’s not going to be easy to draw attention to it.

I couldn’t speak to the insurance department because they were unfortunately closed. I have to phone back ‘first thing’ tomorrow — so perhaps later on this evening, my time, here in the States. I doubt they’d send a new E90 out to me in Las Vegas. I reckon that’s a little bit beyond the standard insurance plan I have. I’ll let you know how I get on. I’m not back in the UK until next Thursday so I think I will be E90-less for more than a week.

If you’re trying to call me, go ahead. It’ll go to Spinvox voicemail, hopefully. And I’ll get the message by email. If not, you can call/text my US mobile number courtesy of Microsoft: +1 702 445 3872.

Here’s the E90 yesterday, in better, joyful times:

Quad-Arse MacLeod. That’s me.

First arse: I flew out of the British Airways Terminal 5 this morning (Saturday morning, that is). Whilst I was sitting waiting to board, I heard a rather stressed sounding lady continually announcing that (”Er, check-in has, er, closed.”)

It seems that things are pretttttty bad with BA and their newly launched Terminal 5. So bad that they just ‘closed’ check-in. Luckily I was already at the gate waiting to board.

Second arse; About three plane loads of happy, eager Chinese folk had just landed in Los Angeles ahead of my flight. Unfortunately it was taking the immigration people about 75% longer (yes, I counted and calculated, the queues were that long) to process them compared to those flashing a British passport. I stood and read my book in the queue.

Third arse: My luggage wasn’t there. Nowhere to be found. Possibly in London, possibly… who the hell knows.

Fourth arse: Vodafone.

I don’t know WHAT I was thinking. I really don’t. For some reason I thought I was on ‘Vodafone Passport’ when I came to the United States. So I merrily called home after I cleared immigration and debriefed as I walked all the way to Terminal 7 in the pleasant LA sunshine. Then I phoned the BA ‘800′ helpline for reporting lost bags. I hung on for a good 20 odd minutes until… until I got that sinking shock of a feeling. You know the one. The one where you think ‘is this… is this? No, it’s ‘Passport’ right? 75p and my normal rates, yes? Or… let me just quickly do a Google and… oh shit.’

Yes. I’ve been blowing 125p a minute for quite a long time. Chump. YOU TOTAL CHUMP, MACLEOD!

I don’t know WHAT I was thinking.

Well, I thought that America is a first world country (Forgetting that debacle in New Orleans). I also thought that Arooon and his mates OWN Verizon. They OWN it. Vodafone OWNS one of the United States’ biggest networks. Yes it’s CDMA but you know, they OWN it, ergo they sorted out roaming, yes?

No.

So that’ll look good on the bill..

Meantime, I’m pleased to say my Vodafone USB broadband modem is working perfectly (I haven’t had the balls to check what the costs will be yet). Lucky, because the shit-rubbish-crap T-Mobile Wireless Internet has gone ‘Bulgaria’.

My father’s had to travel to Bulgaria regularly for quite a while and he was initially really annoyed (and now delights in telling anyone) about the fact that the best hotel in the city — I think it’s Bulgaria we’re talking about — has wireless throughout the building. Just, the wireless router isn’t actually plugged into an internet connection. So, strictly speaking, the hotel has wireless. It does. Just, no *internet*. Exactly like Terminal 7 at LAX. Thank you Vodafone.

Gahhh.

So no sodding luggage, a hugely expensive Vodafone handset and LUCKILY I brought my iPhone running my 55p/min T-Mobile account. There’s life in the old girl that is the slightly bedraggled T-Mobile, yet.

After the sale rumours that followed Vodafone last year over its stake in Verizon Wireless, it looks like the decision to hold onto 45 percent of the US operator has paid off. According to the Financial Times, Vodafone has revealed it expects to start receiving dividends from its share in Verizon Wireless again from next year.

The paper reports Verizon Wireless last issued dividends back in 2005, it handed over £923 million, with the company deciding subsequently to pay down debt rather than issue dividends and quotes an analyst as suggesting that Verizon should indeed start paying out next year but at a lower level than previously.

So does this make it more or less likely that Vodafone will sell? After all, if it holds on longer, it’ll get to see some pay back for its investment. But, the resumption of dividends also means that its stake could fetch a higher price if Vodafone decided to put it up for sale. And then there’s the question of the 700Mhz spectrum auction, which Verizon Wireless emerged victorious from. While it got itself a juicy section of spectrum, it also shelled out a lot for the privilege. There’s got to be some heads being scratched at Vodafone right now.

After a lot of digging, I managed to find the right page to work out the costs of calling abroad from your UK Vodafone.

It’s like having a flash back to 1997.

125 pence a minute to call the States from a standard Vodafone connection. More than a quid a minute!

Buy the 2.50/month international call saver option — something I briefly considered — and you’ll only pay 25p a minute to America.

I reckon that’s far too high a premium nowadays.

It’s 30p a minute to call the States from a 3UK handset. No international caller option required. That’s .. well, it’s better than 125p.

How do you dial internationally from your handset? Or don’t you bother?

Got into Barcelona and thought I should phone my other half to let her know my status.

Vodafone Passport is pretty neat. 75p per connection and international calls are then made at your standard service plan rates. Really good if you’re making 20 minute calls. But they get you on the quick 20 second calls that you’re used to making when you’re back home.

And there’s a fair use policy:

For each call you receive that lasts more than 60 minutes, a 20p per minute charge applies from the 60th minute onwards. This is charged in per second increments.

So this was my first actual experience of Vodafone Passport. I sent a text message to her to check if she was available to receive a call.

Got a reply back saying yes.

I phoned her.

Voicemail.

Shit.

75p for caling her voicemail.

COME ON!

Then she called me.

Arse. 75p again.

So that’s 150p blown. Still, the clarity was brilliant and I felt I was able to relax on the call, rather than stressing at T-Mobile 55p/min rates.

What’s your experience with Vodafone Passport?

I’m off to Barcelona to meet with HP and discuss blog relations with them. I always thoroughly enjoy talking blogging and blog relations with people.

I would have used the on-board t-mobile wifi connection here on the Heathrow Express to connect to the internet, but instead, I thought I’d try out my new Vodafone USB modem. It’s performing well, even on this fast train. Faandabbydosey.

I posted a quick summary of James Whatley’s Vodafone experience just a few moments ago — just as this update arrived in my inbox… Over to James…

- - -
First up, if you missed the rant
on Friday, then you should go catch up or else none the following will make much sense.

HOLD MUSIC – BA BADADA BA BA BA DADA – BA BADADA BA BA BA DADA

Up to speed? Good.

Next up - I’m still with Vodafone.

Why?

Well. You’ll see.

Thing is, this whole episode has really got me thinking about a LOT of stuff. So there’s a lot to cover with this follow up post, it might turn into another long one… So once again, thanks for reading.

First up – let’s pick up from where we left off.

The early hours of Friday morning:

01:30 – I email my rant over to Ewan

01:45 – He hits publish

01:46 – I post on Jaiku

04:52 – Nokia Geek re-posts the story on
his blog

07:40 – The story re-appears over on the blog by iFelix

08:57 – An SMS arrives from a friend within the walls of VF:

“Would you like me to try and escalate your N95 problem internally? Or would you prefer the vanilla experience?”

I choose the latter, (thank you though for your kind offer – you know who you are).

09:30 – Steve Litchfield links back to the story over at All
About Symbian

Then, at 09:39, the phone rings:

“Hello, James Whatley…”

“Hello there Mr Whatley, my name’s Amy and I’m calling from Vodafone. I hope you don’t mind me getting in contact like this, I’ve just been reading your blog…”

[Note from Ewan: We're speculating that 'Amy' is indeed Amy Rose as covered before on SMS Text News]

“I see…”

“Yes, I searched for your name on our system and then cross referenced the notes on the accounts that I found with your written version of events to see which James Whatley it could be and.. well I found you!”

“Right you are.”

“Mr Whatley, I’m dreadfully sorry for everything’s that happened regarding your N95. We’ve investigated it as much as we can this end and it seems the insurers have rather a lot hoops to jump through to process these claims, something we’re trying to rectify. And you see it’s basically a lot of red tape that we can’t really do much about…”

“Ok…”

“However, I’ve been in touch with them and sorted everything out and we should be able to get a replacement phone out to you as soon as possible. Now this normally happens on the next working day, but I’m going to make a few calls and see if we can’t get it out to you today.”

“Oh well, thank you very much…”

“Only thing is Mr Whatley, we don’t actually stock the silver N95 anymore. We only have the 8GB version, is that going to be ok?”

“Well, er… I actually prefer the silver one if I’m perfectly honest, but I can’t knock it I guess. It’s very kind of you to reach out like this. Yes. Ok. I’ll take it. Cheers.”

“Right then, I’ll sort things out with the insurance company. You will still have to pay the £25 excess charge for claiming but I can just pop that onto your next bill. I’ll give you a call back in a bit to confirm delivery.”

Brilliant. Fantastic. Wonderful.
Or is it?

We’ll come back to this one. Moving on.

09:50 – I get an email from Colin over at Nokia WOMWorld:

“Hi James

Your two week trial period for the N82 has finished, therefore we need to organise the return of the device…

Just kidding! Read about your “kaput” N95, so out of the goodness of our hearts we will extend the N82 trial period. How about I send out a bluetooth headset too, make it easier for you to call/pester/complain to Vodafone whilst on the move?”

I very nearly spat my latte out laughing… This did make me smile. A lot. Cheers guys.

10:00 – Steve over at S60Blogger made sure he
mentioned it too – which, incidentally, then got picked up a few more times on some insurance aggregation sites

10:10 – Paul Sweeney of VoiceSage talks about the Expectations
of GREAT Customer Service

11:29 – I come back to my desk and I have a missed call plus one new SMS:

Hi James, it’s Amy calling from Vodafone. Just calling you back as promised earlier. Got good news the phone is gonna be delivered to you today. Should be with you around 2:30. I will give you a call back, I’ll try you again in a little while just so that I can have another chance to chat to you. Thank you. Bye. - Spoken through SpinVox

14:30 you say? Not bad at all.

Lunch time rolls around and the department head out for a colleague’s birthday lunch.

13:25 – The phone rings:

“Hi, is that James Whatley?”

“Yes mate.”

“Alright, I’m just on Marlow High Street, looking for Wethered House (SpinVox HQ), can you direct us?”

“Actually mate, I’m just on the High Street myself. In Chez Gerard…”

“Oh I can see that, I’ll come meet you.”

13:30 – Yours truly takes delivery of a brand new, never-been-opened Nokia N95 8GB.

Just shy of 12hrs since the original article went live.

So – What have we learnt?

First thing: Vodafone have some kind of ‘Forum Intervention Team’ who are happy to step up to the plate whenever things need fixing, (but we knew this already).

This I must say is a HUGE step forward for any operator/network and is something the rest of the industry can learn from.

To have a team in place monitoring the blogosphere for anything of this nature is a great string to Vodafone UK’s bow.
And it’s the exact same thing I used to do 18mths ago for Refresh Mobile, (way back in their Mobizines days).

So kudos to you Red; you came through and you delivered. Nice work.

BUT.

And this is a big BUT that was repeated to me over email, IM, Jaiku, Twitter, SMS and even over the phone from my friends and colleagues alike:

“BUT JAMES?! Well done and everything – But what about the average user? If this happened to your Mum she wouldn’t sit down and write two thousand words on how annoyed she was nor would she know the right platform/channels to use to air said grievances! So, what about your Normobs?!”

Well. There’s a few ways you can look at this.

Ewan bet me £5 that I could’ve got a replacement handset from in-store over the weekend and he was probably right. So did I get preferential treatment? Yes. You could say I did. If I was your average every day customer without access to a reasonably well-read wireless news site, would I have got my replacement handset on the same day? Doubtful, (don’t forget though, I still had to pay the £25 excess, just like anyone else – all VF saved me was time).

This however does not necessarily make Vodafone bad. Later that day I was contacted by another friend of mine, again within the walls of Vodafone. He told me about the Forum Intervention Team and how (in his opinion) they do a good job. Not least because they fix what they can online but because every problem they solve gets put back into the system to try and ensure that the same doesn’t happen again. My contact also told me that Vodafone has a ‘Voice of the Customer’ forum. Everyone within Voda has the ability to raise issues to VOC so they can be investigated.

They don’t take this kind of thing lightly.

The good thing (I’m told) is that this whole episode has highlighted the ‘outsourced insurers’ problem to the VOC which will hopefully mean that the end user experience will improve in the long run.

This is great news.

Short term?

If you’re a normob (or if you know one) then the best advice I could give you would be to never give up. Keep calling back, keep kicking up a fuss and keep on keeping on until you get the level of service you think you deserve.

Now in closing; let’s address some of the questions raised in the the
comments of Friday’s piece::

Quite a few of you mentioned that I should’ve taken the insurance girl’s hints and just told them what they wanted to hear. You’re probably right. But you’re gonna have to excuse my naivety on this one chaps; the thought didn’t even cross my mind. I’ve never had to claim on insurance before and well – I didn’t know the game was played as such. I’ll know for future reference… that aside – it’s still a sorry state of affairs if this kind of behaviour is ‘the norm’.

Hands0n had a cheeky dig at the state of my N95. What can I say? I USE my handset! I don’t care for fancy covers or belt clips. My phone is purely functional. Admittedly I use every function available but that doesn’t mean I should keep it wrapped up in cotton wool. I love the battle scars on my N95. It shows how much I’ve really got out of it, y’know?

Maybe I should send it off to some kind of mobile phone war museum… Hehe.

Joking aside, this whole episode has taught us a LOT about Vodafone.

Yes, their CS sometimes falters but it’s clear they do care about their customers.

Yes, they gave me preferential treatment, but it’s only through people venting their anger (online or otherwise) at poor levels of service that any big company has any chance of learning/changing anything.

And the less said about the N95 4GB variant the better…

Last Friday Whatley was, if you recall, seriously unimpressed at the Vodafone Insurance people after his N95 developed a fault with it’s screen.

It wasn’t Vodafone who screwed up, per se. Whatley just had a bit of a negative experience with Vodafone’s outsourced insurance people.

Well, Vodafone contacted him, if memory serves, at about 945am on Friday morning, about 7 and a half hours after I posted his original update.

A new Nokia N95 8GB was placed in his hands, thanks to a particularly impressive courier, by 1pm that same day.

Smart.

We interrupt the scheduled programming to bring you a Whatley on Friday exclusive…

- - -

AAAAAAAAAAARGH!!!

So – Those of you who follow me on Jaiku (http://whatleydude.jaiku.com) or on twitter (http://twitter.com/whatleydude) may have seen this message appear late last night:

“N95 – kaput :’(“

What follows is an account of two hours of my life from the early evening of last night (Thursday).

Vodafone have pissed me off. Their insurance company more so – they are CLEARLY a 3rd party with nothing to do with Vodafone and as such, let them down on an almost spectacular level.
That aside – VF’s CS has seen better days.

If this issue is not resolved by the weekend, I am off to 3.
You heard it here first.

So - What happened?

Well, over the past few weeks the N95 has taken a bit of a beating… it’s, how we say in the UK, ‘been in the wars a bit’. I’ve dropped it left, right and centre and even tossed it here and there too.

Note – it was camera tossing – see here.

Anyway - The phone has been fine. I went to a meeting yesterday afternoon, switched the phone off. All fine. I leave the meeting. Switch the phone on. All fine. I get to the station and, whilst waiting for my train, I decide to check the timetable… This is not possible. Not properly anyway. Because… every time I clicked one of the right sided centre keys, the screen went blank. Bugger.

Train arrives. I get on. I test it again. Same thing; Right centre keys make the screen go blank. Left centre keys bring it back. Bugger it.

I’m just off into town for a couple of drinks with the lass and all of a sudden I have no phone… Damn.

What next? I do what any other Vodafone-loving man would do, I call Vodafone.

Here I have to pause. Here for a second, if merely for sheer dramatic effect I must take a moment… and breathe…

I have waxed lyrical about Red’s amazing customer service before, quite a lot actually; online and off.
Thing is with GOOD customer service, you become used to it.
It becomes “the norm”.
Anything less than above average is… well… just average.

I make the call. Bear in mind that as a ‘card carrying member’ (remember?) of Vodafone’s ‘best care’ program I have come to expect the following to happen:

“Hello Mr Whatley, how can I help you today?”

“Hello there, my phone is broken.”

“Ok Mr Whatley, we can get a replacement out to you with 24hrs, where would you like it to be delivered?”

And. That. Is. It. Job done.

This is what I expected to happen. What I got was something COMPLETELY to the contrary.

CALL 1 (bodes well doesn’t it?)

“Hello Mr Whatley, how can I help you today?”

“Hello there, I wonder if you can help actually. It’s my phone. The screen really, it started to go off and on earlier and now… well now it won’t even come on at all”

“And what phone do you have Mr Whatley? Says here you have the N95, is it the 8GB version?”

“No no, I’ve got an old school original N95.”

“Ok, and did you buy it from a store or over the phone?”

“Over the phone. I NEVER go in store.”

“Ok Mr Whatley, and what do you think may’ve the problem on the phone?”

“I’m not entirely sure to be honest, I do USE my phone. I mean REALLY use it. But I know I’ve definitely dropped it twice in the last two weeks…”

“Oh ok Mr Whatley, no problem. It sounds like you may have to make an insurance claim but that shouldn’t take a minute… Well I’ve just checked and it looks like we don’t actually have any N95s in stock anymore, but that’s ok. The insurance will just send you an 8GB instead… is that ok?”

Leaving aside my N95-1 preferences for a second…

“Oh.. er.. ok, can’t really complain! Yes, I guess that would be fine, thank you!”

“Ok Mr Whatley I’ll just put you through to the insurance department.”

“Thank you very much…”

HOLD MUSIC – BA BADADA BA BA BA DADA – BA BADADA BA BA BA DADA

“Hello you’re through to Vodafone In-sure-antz… *giggle* …”

Note – the giggling – the girl that I was put through to was clearly having some kind of joke on the other end of the line and was finding it hard to control her laughter. Hilarious.

“…Before I go on.. *giggle* stop it *giggle* ..can I just tell.. *giggle* …can I just tell you that callsarerecordedfortraininperposeees…” *muffled laughter*

I’ve worked in a call centre myself. This happens. You just get the giggles sometimes.
However, I wasn’t in the mood.

I hung up and re-dialled 191.
I get through to the woman sitting next to the first woman I spoke to the first time round.

“Oh, sorry to hear what’s happened Mr Whatley, I’ll try and put you through again…”

HOLD MUSIC

“Hi Mr Whatley, I’ve explained all your details and told them what the situation is, I’ll just put you through now…”

“Hello you’re through to Vodafone In-sure-antz, can I take your name please?”

“Haven’t you got it…? Ok. James Whatley”

“And how can I help?”

“You mean you weren’t told?”

“You want to make a claim sir?”

“Yes. The screen on my N95. It’s broken. I need to get it replaced.”

“And when did it break sir?”

“This afternoon.”

“As a result of what sir?”

“Well, I’ve dropped it recently.”

“When sir?”

“A couple of times. RECENTLY”

“Oh. So the screen was working today then sir?”

“Yes.”

“Did you drop it today sir?”

“No, but I think it’s an issue of overall wear and tear if you will…”

“But you didn’t drop it today sir?”

“Well, no but…”

“Well then the screen failure can’t be down to you dropping it Sir, *sigh*, it’s a warrantee issue. I’ll pass you back to customer care.”

Turns out ‘pass you back to customer care’ is a euphemism for ‘hang up on you’.

If you’ve made it this far – thank you – I applaud your reading efforts. By this time I had travelled from Oxford to Paddington and I’m now at Paddington Station when I make call number 3.

“Hello there, I don’t have time to go through this again. I just want to complain about the poor standard of service that your insurance company provides. First they lack professionalism and second they show no real willingness to help and/or cooperate…”

“Of course Mr Whatley, what is the problem?”

I explain. THIS TIME ROUND I’m advised that I will have to take the phone IN STORE to have it examined…

“Look. I don’t have time to do this now. I called to complain. I need to get on the tube. I’ll call back later…”

By now I am seething. I get off the tube at London Waterloo and the lass is running a little late. “I’ll try again” I think… CALL 4

“Hello there, I’ve had a rough time with CS so far this evening. I understand this isn’t your fault so I won’t scream and shout. My N95. It’s broken.”

“Ok sir, which one do you have? The 4GB or the 8GB?”

“Pardon?”

“Which N95 do you have sir? The 4GB or the 8GB?”

“Er… There isn’t a 4GB.”

“Yes there is Sir, it’s ok, you’ve probably got the 8GB, the black one right sir?”
(this time in a slightly condescending kind of ‘it’s ok sir, you don’t know about your silly little broken phone’ voice)

“Look, I don’t have the 8GB version of the phone. I have the silver one…”

“..The 4GB.”

“NO! THERE IS NO 4GB N95! I work in the bloody industry and I know this phone inside and out and unless you’ve started shipping them with a 4GB MicroSD card as standard then it does not exist. The original N95, the silver one, the one IN MY HAND, comes with 160MB internal flash memory and 64MB RAM. Not 4GB.”

“I’m sorry sir but…”

“Look, let’s no split hairs. I know I’m right on this. It’s not why I called. I called because my phone is broken…”

“Yes Mr Whatley, says here you’ve been advised to take it in-store to have it examined?”

“Yes, that’s right. But that’s not good enough. I need a replacement as soon as…”

“That’s ok sir, if you hand it over in-store they will pop it in a jiffy bag, send it off to be repaired and it will be back with 7 days tops.”

NOTE – I’ve been here before – it NEVER takes seven days. THIS is why I stopped going in-store.

“I doubt that. Plus what am I to do without a phone?”

“They’ll have a phone you can borrow sir…”

“Have you ever had to borrow one from in-store before?”

“They have the Sharp device range sir…”

“Yes. I know. Horrid devices. They’re not nice. Listen. You don’t get it. I’m a mobile phone blogger. It’s what I do. Not having a decent handset in this business is quite frankly a ridiculous notion and I REALLY need to get this sorted ASAP!”

“Yes sir, if you take it in-store tomorrow I’m sure they’ll be able to…”

At this point I gave up. I am SO mad. The phone, FOR WHATEVER REASON, no longer works. Actually, that’s incorrect. The screen no longer works. The phone works fine. In fact, I know my N95 THAT WELL, I’m able to send texts and make calls… in the dark if you will.

Fortunately I am lucky enough to currently be in possession of a Nokia N82 (kindly supplied by those lovely folk at WOM World (http://www.womworld.com/nseries), this device however I have been using as my work phone. That reluctant was I to give up my N95 as my main device I opted to switch out the E61i for the duration of the loan period.

While I’ve been typing up this tirade I’ve been backing up/restoring/sync-ing each device to switch the N82 into my main device and the E61i back to my work device.

Incidentally – I’m not even touching upon the review of the N82 yet, or the amazing differences between the Nseries and the Eseries range of devices that I uncovered by making this switch… they can all wait for another post.

This post - THIS ONE THAT YOU’RE READING RIGHT NOW – is about how disappointed I am with Vodafone. You may call me fickle, but have a read of it again. See if you’d settle for this kind of ‘service’.

I am NOT a happy customer.

And do you know what makes it worse? It’s happened before http://whatleydude.vox.com/library/post/rip-n95.html - same problem(s) http://whatleydude.vox.com/library/post/my-faith-has-been-tested-1.html

This time though there has been no resolve.

The issue is still open.

I genuinely do not know what to do next. My instinct tells me to call VF again - To keep on keeping on. This issue has happened before and I got a replacement within 24hrs.

Why is it any different now?

Why is Vodafone’s customer service so inconsistent?

Why do they allow such a shoddy experience when it comes to their mobile insurance – which, by the way, I PAY EXTRA FOR!

If I don’t have a new N95 by the end of the weekend, or at least, on its way to me by the end of the weekend – as I said at the beginning of this post – I’m going to 3.

And I’ll tell every soul that I ever sold onto Vodafone that they made a mistake and that Vodafone don’t care about their customers, nor do they care for their (outsourced) insurance – that’s not worth the paper it is written on.

With that, I am spent. If you made it to the end, thanks.
If you’ve got a spare N95-1 lying around, let me know – I’m open to offers.

- - -

I have, incidentally, bet Whatley five pounds that if he takes his handset into a Vodafone store tomorrow, they will replace it there and then for him.

But the more I think on it, the more I wonder if actually, that’s not how things work. I wonder if the handsets in store are for ‘brand new customers only’ and not for replacements? We shall see.

Got a call from the FTC today.

Michael Becker of iLoop reckoned I should sit in as a panelist on an upcoming Town Hall meeting that the FTC are putting together on the subject of mobile commerce (and with an emphasis on consumer protection).

The Town Hall will explore consumer protection issues arising in the rapidly expanding world of M-commerce. Topics will include:

* The use of mobile-messaging services as instruments of M-commerce;
* Consumers’ ability to control mobile applications;
* The adaptation of advertising to mobile devices, including the challenges presented by small screen disclosures;
* M-commerce practices targeting children and teens;
* Industry best practices in preventing fraud, disclosing costs, and resolving billing disputes;
* Evolving security threats and solutions; and
* Next-generation products and services.

James Trilling, one of the Attorneys supervising the formulation of the meeting, arranged to call me with colleague Ruth, who identified herself as a regular reader. Nice one Ruth!

I’ve got quite a lot of opinions on mobile commerce. In fact I’m overflowing with them, particularly real experiences since I’ve been out using a lot of American mobile commerce services recently. James tentatively asked my perspective on mobile commerce and consumer protection and within moments I was venting forth on PhonepayPlus’s Fine Day, the STOP command and how I was really impressed at being able to buy a ham sandwich via text with Noah’s Gomobo.com service.

I’m not sure if I’ll qualify for the panel, particularly given my realistic experience and direct approach. I can just imagine how some industry players — the Motorola-RAZR-bearing 55 year old tanned mobile industry executives who’ve only just got to grips with this new ‘texting’ lark — might not be that impressed at my highly reality-based perspective on the industry.

It will be interesting to read the results of the panel.

If you’d like to send some viewpoints for consideration the FTC site notes that…

Interested parties may submit written comments or original research until March 17, 2008.

You’ve got a good couple of days to knock something up and send it over. If you’re working in or around the American mobile industry and you’d like to have a say, I recommend you do so. More details on this page.

To Vodafone. I can’t tell you how delighted I was to receive James’ call. Because I’d have been panicking big time if I was using my T-Mobile handset. On an international call you want the clearest line possible. And since I was actually standing in Liverpool Street Station when James called, there was a lot of external noise. And James and Ruth were on a conference phone. It was just brilliant having what felt like a ‘full signal’ to be able to talk to them without worrying about:

a) the call dropping (on my end)
b) poor general audio quality
c) unpredictable scrambling of the audio

Such a relief. Delighted with my Vodafone connection.