Consumer Communication and Service Providers in Nigeria
By Niran Adedokun
Let me give you an example of what I mean, perhaps, that would jig up your recollection. Have you ever noticed how much we suffer anytime we have a heavy down pour in this country? No, I do not mean the usual heavy traffic jam, especially in Lagos, which is not even within the purview of this piece. What I mean is the difficulty that we experience in making phone calls, getting our dstv decoder to justify our subscription or even withdrawing money from the Automated Teller Machine(ATM) of your bank. I discovered in recent discussions with friends that we are all almost at a point where we have given up on improvement of services such that whenever it rains, we just do not bother, we only wait for the rain to stop hoping that the service provider (whichever it was that we were battling with at that time) would quickly sort itself out
As much as I desire this long-suffering attitude of my compatriots, I am not just blessed with such patience, may God help me. But, while I am awaiting the help of the Almighty, I hardly allow the service providers or their representative get away with any infringement on the peaceable enjoyment of the services for which I have paid. So very often, I call to yell, argue and threaten and get it done usually at the time that they choose. I am always happy to have at least registered my displeasure especially as they always assure me through their customer service phone lines that “this call is recorded for quality assurance purposes...” (whatever that means). But, really, what can one do when one has to deal with the failure of not just one, two or even three service providers to fulfil their own part of the bargain at once?
This has been the dilemma in which I have found myself in the past couple of days and I tell you, I have so shouted myself hoarse that I think the Almighty has finally visited me with the type of patience with which my friends treat this inefficient treatment of customers in Nigeria. How far this would take us though, I cannot tell as I am even convinced that it is the failure of consumers to demand performance from these service providers that has helped all of them to complacency, even those who came from societies where they would never “try” their consumers, get here and become part of the Nigerian scheme.
Take Multichoice, promoters of the DSTV Direct Satellite Television service for instance. How do you pay to reactivate service on your decoder and have to wait for almost 24 hours before you are reconnected, the fact that you have placed not less than three calls to customer service notwithstanding?
The irritation starts with the long automated voice response that you get treated to before you are connected to the “operator”. And when the operator finally comes in, he or she asks you the same questions which you were asked last month and the months before that, you provide your smart card number, your name and then the phone number with which you registered and then the email, after which they may ask other seemingly irritable questions before attending to the complaint for which you have called them. If you are lucky to get your issue fixed immediately, they will then take you through another round of frustrating talk starting with “do you know that ...” of course, I never wait for that. If DSTV or any service provider feels like feeding me with information about new products on how they have improved service delivery, they should find a way of doing that without burning my hard-earned phone credit on that. What do they have our emails and phone numbers for anyway? That should not be for review of tariff and reminders to pay subscription fees alone. In a lot of societies where these types of services exist, there are dedicated toll-free lines for customer enquiry but here they want to run on your own telephone! This past week, I got to understand that DSTV was having some technical problems which made it impossible for them to connect me until the day after I made payment, but even that did not happen until I had called for the umpteenth time on the next day, having to tell the officer my story all over again, an indication that none of the guys who took my calls on the previous day had kept a record of my complaints. If they did as one of them promised, I wouldn’t have needed to call back on the next day and that would have saved my outburst when I called back the next day, as I was so livid and found myself asking the officer attending to me: “have you guys ever been sued...”
This same attitude is what you find with bank officials who conveniently would walk past customers without a word of apology into the ATM room and start “working” on the ATM without saying a word to those customers for another 30 minutes of more. That is when their machines finally work. This past weekend, I had the most frustrating experience from the ATMs of GT Bank.
And what do we say about telecommunications companies. The past four to five days have been hellish. Making phone calls have become almost impossible and it does not matter whether you are on MTN, Globacom, MTN or Airtel (which I am on). For the fourth day running now or so, it has been impossible for me to use the mobile hotspot service on my airtel line, just as Swift Network from which I subscribe for a “wifi 4G internet service” has also failed me! And like other service providers in the sector, you would never be informed about a down site or any other technical problem for that matter until you call in to complain. They just do not think they owe you that courtesy of first information, which really costs them nothing!
Now I understand the challenges that all of the services providers can face in an environment like ours, as a matter of fact, anywhere in the world. What I do not get, what I consider to be the disrespect of it, is the failure of these service providers to promptly inform subscribers about the problems that they have at any point in time and adequately compensate customers for same whenever such problems are resolved. That is the Nigerian angle to the challenges that these kind of businesses face and the one that I do think we should really start to resist!
8 comments:
Interesting read sir. A friend of mine once said 'everything seems to stop working once it rains'. but like you mentioned, the bigger problem is with the attitude of our service providers-a little accountability to clients would make a difference.
Keep Writing :-)
Well said sir, it is only in Nigeria people do what they like. Until we start holding them accountable, which should start from citizens cultivating the habit of asking questions otherwise, it will be business as usual.
If its any consolation, I have been thru that tunnel of frustration and all I could do was vent my anger at these zombies they call customer care representatives. I can practically recite every line they will render once they answer your 1 hour or more wait. all we need is patience...until something is done treat this malaise.
Maybe we need to get one of them and ask why they do that because I had worked in a company where the oga at the top would say "dont say anything to anybody until I give you the go ahead" whenever there is any issue affecting the company and we had to answer customers/ clients' questions. In such situations, the customer service voices will just tell you what they feel will calm you. Even in my present office, whenever there is a downpour, the whole company's server goes down and the IT guys would always tell us "we are working on it" even if that had truncated any important work you are doing. Information is key accountability is even more key and it could be frustrating when you are denied your rightful service or attention but when you are in a 'tight corner" like the customer guys always find themselves, what can you do?
At this point we have to do little more than hope it gets better. As you have rightly mentioned , these "people" get payed for the services rendered thus the consumers deserve a right to get value.
This is a very good start, with more consumers speaking their minds I trust that things will turn around for the better.
Thank you for this.
Very interesting read and so true. What I believe is lacking is a strong consumer protection culture in our society. If the various organs with oversight responsibility for these 'service providers' are alive to their responsibilities, we wouldn't be in such dire straits. Unfortunately, they usually don't do anything unless the provider in question is 'worth the time and effort". Even then, the main goal is to fine the provider and not find ways to ensure that the service quality is improved.
These supervising ministries and agencies, should look for ways to ensure quality of service by pushing for legislature where necessary, regular meetings with the service providers to discuss their challenges, insisting on minimum standards etc
We are still a long way off but I believe, we'll get there.......Nigeria has a great future!
hhhhhmmmmmmm, is anytin working in nigeria, from our banking sector, to telecommunication, security agents, politicians, roads, water, power supply etc...... may God help us and heal our land
This goes to show that Nigerians are docile (no offence intended). We lack the guts to challenge these service providers and even when some consumers do, others make them look like some bunch of low life. I wonder what the so-called number portability rave was about if all the telecommunications companies are the same. I think service providers need attitudinal change to assuage their consumers perception of them. Lastly, the regulators of these organisations pay little or no attention to their roles and responsibilities.