the big guys – Wayne Connor

Virgin Mobile

Wayne — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 10:20:07 +0000

In 2007 I had a problem with Virgin Mobile.

Here is the first letter I sent:

I didn’t hear back so I sent a second letter:

I still didn’t hear back so I rang the Telecommunications Ombudsman who said I’d be better of taking it up with my Credit Card people. So I rang the credit card people, they were very very good. They rang me back and said they had given Virgin a set time to fix the problem.

Since then you can now access your Virgin cap plan balance from the web.

My only advice is write everything down. Make notes of every conversation you have with a phone company.

Beware the telstra pre-paid cap encore offer!

Wayne — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 03:16:46 +0000

I took advantage of the latest Telstra Encore offer on prepaid mobile where for $40 you get $550 worth of calls, but it ran out in the first day – very strange… how could I use $550 worth of calls in one day?

BEWARE THE FINE PRINT….

They dramatically increase the call costs if you switch to the Encore Plan… it’s a marketing lie…

So checking the special call rates for if you happen to take this wonderful telstra offer…

For example… calls to Vanuatu go up to $5.99 per minute compared to $1.45 on any other pre-paid plan.

USA rates go up to 99c compared to 15c on the simplicity plan.

The worst is calls to New Zealand are a massive $3.49 per minute compared to 20c per minute on the Simplicity plan!

So your $550 worth of ‘free’ calls on the Encore plan are actually worth as little as $31 depending on where you call – less than what you paid for them.

Thanks Telstra

Normal Telstra call rates for pre-paid mobile

Call rates are inflated when you go on Telstra Encore cap plan

Woolworths not so fresh

Wayne — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 00:46:05 +0000

The latest issue of Woolworths fresh boasts ‘tasty gluten free recipes’ on the front cover. So I grabbed a copy. The first recipe is on page 55 for gluten free pancakes:

Prepare Macro Gluten Free Buttermilk Pancake mix 300g according to instructions on the bottle.

I kid you not – this is the recipe!

Workcover NSW fireworks single use licence bar code problem

Wayne — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 01:26:05 +0000

There is a problem with the workcover Fireworks single use form, FE03. The bar code is the pdf if blurry so that no matter what printer you print it on, it won’t scan at the post office.

I just thought it would be good to have a record of this on the Internet so that if anyone is Google searching the problem they can find an answer.

So there is no way round the problem – you will just have to print off the form with the bad barcode take it to Australia Post and they will take five or 10 min trying to work out what the actual code is – looking it up in their book manually.

You might want to report it to workcover, but I just tried, and after half an hour, and taking to three different people, I finally got onto a lady who said that WorkCover weren’t interested in fixing unless more people reported the problem because the form has been out there for five years and no one has reported the problem! That’s 5 years of post offices having to look up the form number manually!

I explained that the reason no one has reported the problem is most likely that the post office tell you it’s a problem with your printer, and even if you did ring WorkCover who is going to be the good Samaritan and spend half an hour on the phone just to tell WorkCover there is a problem with their form?

I don’t think I’ve ever come across a…

Wayne — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 05:57:50 +0000

I don’t think I’ve ever come across a company with as bad customer interaction as Telstra.

This is from their front page to sign up for broadband…

If you dial 1800 220 020 what do you get?

“Your call could not be connected. Please check the number and try again!”

And this is a phone company…

Bigpond – try again!

Wayne — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 19:50:55 +0000

I had the funniest call from Telstra Bigpond today. A guy was trying to sell me wireless internet, from bigpond, but the phone kept cutting in and out and he kept saying “Hello… Hello… I seem to be having a problem with the phone… hello… Are you there sir…”
So I thought I would help him out. I asked him if he was using a landline or VOIP, he was using ‘internet phone’. I asked if it was through Telstra – he said yes!
Poor fellow. I said ‘so you are tryign to sell me broadband that doesn’t even work’ and he encouraged me that it works well for internet, just not for phone!
Oh well. Better luck next time.