While many complaints to cellphone service providers seem to fall on deaf ears, one Grahamstown man wants to orchestrate a mass of reports to one company for overall better signal and services in the area.
While many complaints to cellphone service providers seem to fall on deaf ears, one Grahamstown man wants to orchestrate a mass of reports to one company for overall better signal and services in the area.
Weak and fluctuating cellphone signal isn’t new to Vodacom customers in Grahamstown so resident Andy Soper feels it’s time to unite for better service.
“The idea is to send simultaneous complaints in order to get them to improve their service,” he said.
“The increased usage [of smartphones]is almost certainly straining Vodacom’s local infrastructure. Their income from local users is increasing and the quality of their service is deteriorating.”
As individual complaints don’t carry the same weight as the official collective complaint from a group, Soper set up a survey and complaint form on the iTutor Grahamstown website.
The survey encourages locals to SMS or email the location and nature of their signal problems in Grahamstown so that something can be done to improve the situation.
Thus far Soper has received over 24 official complaints to send to Vodacom and he feels quite positive about the survey.
However owner of the local Vodacom outlet and Videotronic, Glenn Arthur, said he met with Vodacom officials in Port Elizabeth on Monday and “Vodacom is aware of the issues and they have short and long-term plans in place”.
Vodacom’s executive head of media relations Richard Boorman said the company is currently experiencing a connectivity boom in which more connections mean a need for additional base stations to accommodate the higher traffic volume.
“We’re spending approximately R7 billion in SA this year on network investment and in the last three months alone added over 300 new 3G base stations. Having said this, in many areas and this includes Grahamstown, we’re struggling to identify and get approval for new sites,” Boorman said.
“We’re aware of the reception issues that some customers in Grahamstown are experiencing and understand how frustrating this is. We have a plan to improve the situation and are working with the municipality to get approval for new sites.”
