Migrating to Cell C from Vodacom, simple and painless
Posted on June 6, 2012
After 16 long years with Vodacom the time had come. After a number of battles (see here, here and here) trying to get them to respect me as their customer and comply with the Consumer Protection Act, the decision was made. Instead of righting their wrongs, Vodacom chose to let me cancel my contracts early (some 6 months after my CPA compliant against them). I jumped at the chance, done deal. Bye bye Vodacom.
The timing was good. Cell C had announced their 99cents prepaid option with a promise of decent contract rates to come , which have now been announced and are indeed good – for each rand you spend you get an anytime minute, a meg of data and an SMS.. I looked into how to make all this happen and found that it was not as difficult as one may imagine.
To avoid having to deal with call centres I chose to go into the Vodacom walk in customer centre in Gateway shopping centre. I explained what I wanted to the consultant and he suggested the best approach.
First thing needed was to convert my postpaid account into a prepaid account. He wanted a copy of my ID and proof of residence and within a few minutes it was done. All free minutes etc were lost in this process, but since I was leaving Vodacom I didn’t really mind.
Next stop, the Cell C shop. Again no major challenges this side. I purchased a starter pack (for 99c) and an airtime voucher (R70).
The agent then RICA’d my SIM after being supplied with the now standard ID and proof of residence. He then showed me the instructions on how to do the number port (printed on the back of the SIM pack).
Simple.
All I needed to do was to send an SMS from my old number and then the process would be started, and within 24hrs I would receive some confirmation SMSs and at that point insert my new Cell C SIM card, load my airtime and Bob’s your uncle.
First snag. I tried to send the SMS but it failed. No airtime on the Vodacom prepaid SIM. Damn, I should have seen that one coming. No problem, a few hours later bought R5 airtime at the local Spar and send the SMS.
Within a few minutes I had the reply telling me all was underway, and by the next morning there were more confirmation SMSs to tell me to go ahead and insert the new SIM. With the old SIM the phone was showing NO Service, so clearly had been deprovisioned.
I popped in the next SIM and it worked a treat. Cell C SMS’d me all the new settings needed for SMS, MMS etc, applied them and all was great.
After that it was just a matter of getting used to the new voice mail services, balance enquiry and the like. Everything is running just great now. Very happy to have moved.
Categories: Consumer Protection Act, Gadgets, Mobile
How do migrate from voda to cell c
25.03.2013 09:41
If you take a look at a Cell C starter pack (pick one up at your local supermarket for R10 or less) there are detailed instructions on the back. Pretty easy
28.03.2013 21:23
Congrats to the ranks of the Vodacom unspammed.
I had more than my share of abusive behaviour from Vodacom. About a year ago I also fired them as my provider. I have also documented their escapades.
Interestingly the bluntly refused my challenge to do the “right thing” when I challenged them. Way after the new CPA came into effect, they were still spamming me despite notification that I did not want to receive their SMS messages and telephone calls.
ICASA did not help, WASPA did not help, HelloPeter did not help, public shaming did not help. In the end I found out there is simply no communication between Vodacom marketing and the customer database / service reps. However their marketing director hides behind this vast empire’s minions. I wish I had his cell to just SMS him timely and untimely to advise how glad I am today to not be on their spam list … whoops, customer list …anymore.
http://za-citizen.blogspot.com/
UnVodacom’ed and peaceful bliss!
29.06.2012 00:40
Congrats! I am also with Vodacom for 16 yrs and have had enough of their poor service. My contract expires at the end of July and I have already given them notice to cancel it. I will also be moving to Cell C.
25.06.2012 09:55