Cell C
reviews and complaints

Last year November (2015) I had upgraded my cell phone contract with Cell C. Firstly receiving the phone took over a month due to incompetent staff who had cancelled the upgrade which took a further 2 weeks to rectify. Upon finally receiving the handset (Sony Xperia M5) it took a further 2 days just to get a sim-swop complete. Next the airtime and data that I had accumulated had not been carried over in excess of R300.00, and it continues not to be carried over each month as it should be, after 6 months there is still no resolution. To add to the frustration the handset heats up and shuts-off. When I had spoken to the customer care agent to report the problem he (Skhumbuzo Ndhlovu) had stated that they have had many reports of the handset (Sony Xperia M5) having that very same issue, he did admit that it was a know fault on this particular phone yet it is still offered on the contract and the customer is not informed of it.
the handset has now gone in for repairs for the second time and the feedback from Cell C is that they will not replace the handset if Sony does not find a fault. My contract is not with Sony, it is with Cell C. I have requested many times that I switch to a different handset with a different contract. Trying to get any feedback or help from the customer care is impossible, it is like speaking to mindless repetitive recording programmed to only say the same thing. The problem had been reported in January 2016 as I had been on holiday in December. it is now the end of April 2016 and there is still no resolution. I am beyond frustration at this point and not seeming to get any help on the matter from Cell C. I have went further and posted a complaint on Hello Peter which again was just brushed under the carpet and took almost a week to get a response.
I am constantly paying every month for a handset that I am unable to use and cannot get any help from Cell C as to a resolution.
The Handset had went in for repairs the second time and despite being promised it will be prioritized it took almost 3 weeks for me to receive it back with the same fault. the Handset itself comes up with an error that the camera will heat up and switch of while being used.
There is a known and obvious problem with the handset yet I am being forced to continue and pay for a contract that does not serve me.
I believe that my rights as a customer are being immensely violated.
I am beyond the point of frustration with the gross disrespect I as a customer am receiving. Attached are emails I have sent to Skhumbuzo Ndhlovu as well as the messages I have been sending to the Cell C Facebook page.

I requested closure of my Autopage account in Feb 2016, a few months after the end of contract term. As per 30 day requirement the contract was only cancelled on 27 March 2016 and number converted to prepaid since then. Auto page was paid in full till date of termination. We have been using the phone on prepaid since then. In April 12 2016, Glocell (who have taken over the autopage contract customers) billed me R157.26 for the month of April contract that hence does not exist. I called them a few times, sent them emails but got no response or feedback to rectify the situation or even an apology from them. I am now left with the only option of taking legal action against them for such a simple issue, which they refuse to fix.

Just received my April 2016 bill from Cell C only to find that the amount due is now R129 and not the contracted R110. On querying with their call centre was told that it was due to an upgrade (which I have no idea about). I have not requested for any upgrade neither have I received anything extra e.g. handset, more airtime, etc. So what have they upgraded?

I am still awaiting for them to resolve this issue and cannot get anyone to accept this responsibility. It's a mission to get in contact with someone who can assist. I think the best option is to cancel my debit order with my bank and watch Cell C jump!

I received a call from a Cell c consultant(Thando) on the 31/03/2016 regarding a R99 contract for a LTE WIFI router. I was unsure about the contract and required the consultant to call me back on the 01/04/2016 which she did and not a minute too late. We concluded the contract as normal and she promised delivery will take place on the 04/04/2016. I waited till the 05/04/2016 as no delivery took place but no consultant bother to contact me. I spoke to Annelesa and she said that the current router is out of stock and I required waiting for a week but as I mentioned above no SMS or call was made to me. I then spoke to Warren on the 05/04/2016 and he explained the same that the router is out of stock and that the LTE router is much faster but they can provide me a 3g router. I declined the offer and requested to wait for the LTE router. I then followed on the 12/04/2016 and spoke to Anjela and she stated that I require waiting an additional 2 weeks for the LTE Router and at no point did I say I wanted the 3G router. I received delivery on the 15/04/2016(15 days after conclusion of contract) and the ZTE MF65M 3G router was delivered. So I phoned Cell C once more and spoke to Nondu, she stated that the consultant has changed my order from the LTE router to the 3G router, this was done without my consent as I waited 2 full weeks for the LTE router so why would I change my mind for the 3G router. This is a lack of customer service and I am really frustrated with the consultants at Cell C. The client has to follow with a service Cell C is providing. Consultants will follow up timeously to ensure you take the contract but no after care after the contract is concluded. I have logged a complaint and the reference number to pick the 3G router is: 0bf184972. I require some action to be taken and I require that I get the correct router now as this contract is almost a month overdue.

I was at Cell c in Somerset Mall in Cape Town on the 09/04/2016 to apply for a new Laptop contract, the sales consultant that assisted me took my personal details ( Id copy, Payslip and 3 months bank statements). She advised me that she cant assist me on that as her PC kept on being off line, she promised to call me on Sunday to give me feed back on my application since then she has never called me i also called the number she gave to me i'm not getting through. I'm so disappointed with their service.

I had to upgrade my children's phones. My son wanted a Samsung Gear S2 for his birthday, but as they were not available yet, I asked the salesperson who attended to my upgrade, if there are specific phones compatible with the Gear, they told me all smartphones with android 4.4 and higher 1.5 GB RAM will be compatible. As I was looking at the Samsung J7, they told me it will be compatible. He also told me that I will be able to get a contract on the Gear separately once they do have stock. Now a month later as I enquire about the stock, they inform me that the Samsung Gear S2 is only compatible with the Samsung S6 & 7, and you need to do a contract on the two together. So now I sit with a phone without a Gear and my son without his birthday gift as I can not afford the Gear on prepaid.

18 March 2016 - Received a call from a CellC consultant regarding an upgrade on a contract I have with them. The last upgrade was done in February 2014 and a Samsung Galaxy S4 was received. The consultant told me she is phoning about an upgrade for a new handset on a 2nd contract I have with Cell C. According to her the contract with the Samsung Galaxy S4 was already upgraded telephonically with a CellC call centre in KZN. I reside in Gauteng. According to the records under my name and ID number the new handset, a Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge (Gold in colour) was despatched to Kopane Hospital, 2 Casino Road Vereeniging. I don't have any family or acquintance living in Vereeniging. This handset was already despatched on 3 October 2015 and was signed for under my name at 10:25 am on 6 October 2015. They even gave me the cell number of the person who signed for it. Obviously my Identity has been compromised and used to receive an illegal upgrade. The cellphone was despatched with a sim card as well, which means this individual has a duplicate sim? Now Cell C want me to send them a copy of my ID again plus a copy of my Bank Statement ... BIG JOKE! THROUGH CELL - C MY IDENTITY WAS ALREADY COMPROMISED ONCE!.

I took a contract out via Call Direct. I specifically asked the sales person about the phones capabilities as I am a National Financial Manager and need to receive emails on my phone etc. I was assured that the phone he was recommending was better that my current phone. When I activated my new handset I found in fact that it was not the case. The phone does not have the functionalities I require and actually reboots itself when you try to open 2 apps. I logged a call and complaint with regards to this and have been waiting since the 17th of February 2016 for someone to resolve my issue. if I need to upgrade I understand but surely I should have been contacted to resolve by now. I keep phoning the customer care / helpline and get the same response every time. What do I have to do? do I cancel my contract with Cell C? Do I contact my attorney to sue for false advertising? do I file a complaint in relations with the new consumers protection act? I know there is a recorded call. I know that should you listen to that call, you will hear the sales agent tell me that this handset is capable. Please advise what I should do.

In August 2015 I upgraded my contract that would have expired in 2 months time and received a new handset. The very next day I returned the phone because of battery issues. I was told to wait seven days. I was not able to do so and asked the contract to be cancelled. I was told that I must e-mail customer care and request cancellation. That same day I mailed customer care whom then responded that I can only cancel the contract 30 days prior to contract expiry date.
30 Days later I mailed again and now they started passing the buck. Customer service refer me to the shop and the shop refer me to the customer care. 4 months down the line I get told that the contract cannot be cancelled. When I started making an issue I ended up speaking to a Funilwe whom then with her managers permission indicated that the contract is now cancelled and the last payment will be deducted on Feb 2015. Now when I phone for confirmation no one can assist me and apparently the contract is not cancelled. I have been paying a contract now for the past 5 months of which I have not receive a upgraded handset and all contact is being rejected. I also do not seem to get this process escalated.

One of my employees took out a contract at Cell C Canal Walk Cape Town on the [protected]. The very next day he returned the handset due to it switching off the whole time. They told him he must wait 7working days for something he did not have any use of. He currently is sitting without a phone due to them not making a plan to get the unit back in seven days. He phoned today and they told him the handset is still in for repairs and they will let him know when it is ready for collection. I am now sitting with a employee that i cant get hold of when i send him to a site. He also told me that Cell C has taken money off from him in the mean time for something he has no use of.

On 21 January 2016 after going through my cellphone accounts I found that I have been billed for Get It services which I cancelled in October 2014(as confirmed by the call center agent Lezanne call reference number [protected]). She then told me I asked for it to be reinstated during August 2015. I didn't ask for the reinstating as I found the service useless, I was paying for something not used hence the cancellation. She advised me that she would log a request for them to pull the call where I requested the reinstating of this. She advised it would take between 2 - 4 working days. I followed up on 25 January again, where the call center agent then told me it's still being investigated. after numerous follow ups and the same story, I posted a report on Halo Peter on the 3rd of February, I was told that this will be resolved. Nothing happened. I called Friday 5 February and Jasmine was going to call me back Saturday the 6th with feedback as she was in possession of the call. Up to date I have had no feedback from them. No refund has been made to me yet, the total costs amount to more or less R, 1000 already.

I purchased a new contrac at cell c centurion on 3rd October 2015. At the advice of Samantha, she recommended the Nokia Lumia 640 windows phone for dual sim. I didn't want 2 running contracts, so I purchased as per her advice the lumia 640 - [protected] on contract and she suggested I cancel the old contract [protected] when I was able to and to convert this number to a prepaid. This I did when I had the funds. However the sim card didn't fit. Cell C East Rand mall suggested a sim swap as they don't have tools to cut sim cards. They referred me to autopage for that. Why when I used them as my provider. I did the sim swap and was told to wait until old sim was deactivated and then insert new sim card of [protected] into the lumia 640 dual sim phone - new contract [protected]. However the message I get is emergency calls only. I spoke to Roeleen the branch manager at east rand mall cell c and she stated windows lumia 640 phones have had this problem since early last year. They simply won't operate as dual sim phones. Why are cell c advertising these phones as dual sim phones, selling them to people like me under false advertising when they know all well they wont work. Customer care is not aware of this, but east rand mall branch is? The sold the phone to me under false pretences and now refuse to cancel the contract without cost to me. I have the brochure advertising the phone as a dual sim phone and expect it to operate as such. Well they don't. I want my contract cancelled, my number retained and a new contract with a dual sim phone that actually works. Cell c continue to advertise specials on this device to unsuspecting customers who are not aware of the fact that the phone wont function as a dual sim phone. This is illegal practice.

Good day I sent phone for repairs at cell c in November because I could not receive or make calls. I was told my phone was blocked by some called Mike and he says he did it by mistake. Every time I go to cell c umlazi mega city they tell me my phpne is not yet fixed. When I email customer care they tell me my phone is in the shop. I have wasted petrol so many times going to umlazi branch but with no success. I actually dont want this phone back and they should give me a new one. Iv been calling and im veing thrown from pillar to post with no avail.

I upgraded two of five contracts at Cell C +- 3 months ago and requested that the number attached to one of them be removed from my account and made pre-paid and that another number that was pre-paid be attached to that particular contract as it is that number which uses the device. All was understood ( I was assured ) but soon after I was contacted to effect these simple changes we realized that the consultant only swapped the numbers on the sim cards and my wife now receives calls meant for my son and vice versa. This is costing me R 200.00. I also upgraded a third line on my contract for my youngest daughter as a present for having been promoted at school and received a faulty Sony M 5 handset ( the camera does not function properly ). I reported this and attempts for collection have failed thus far, I have been waiting for the couriers since 18 December 2015 and endless promises. Unbelievably I have a third issue which fortunately I was able to sort out with one of the Cell c stores and also deserves a mention but the above two needs more urgent attention. CONRAD [protected]

On the 28th of may I enquired about ending the contracts that I have with cell c. The operator told me the one can be ended on may but I habe to phone again on jume for the other one because it was then 3 momths before contract ended. On june I pjoned again to end my contract for the other phone and the operator said september contract will end. Sept I emailed cell c again to conferm the cancellation and heard nothing back. It is now december and they are still deducting money for a contract that I cancelled june already. When I phoned them 30 dec the operator said the contract wasnt cancelled

I upgraded my contract with Cell C on Monday 14/12/2015 and received my new phone Thursday 17/12/2015. I have ben trying to do the sim swop required for the new nano sim since 12:20 Thursday and have been sent from pillar to post, receiving empty promises and nothing has ben done yet. It now is Friday 18/12/2015 11:12. Is there anyone that could posiibly assist me. I have spoken to so many persons at Cell C already, spending more than three hours on the phone.

An upgrade was processed on my contract on 26 October 2015 in error. This was reported to the company and they gave us assurance that they would listen to telephonic conversations, rectify the error and reinstate my old contract. I am not in possession of any new handset or any other benefits which the upgrade proposed and nor am I receiving any benefits from my old contract. Nearly a month on, after approximately 10-15 calls to their head office, complaints lodged on social platforms such as Hellopeter and even the watchdog ICASA, the error has not been rectified, yet I am still been charged for the benefits of my old contract. They have social media consultants, who have no knowledge of customer accounts, responding to queries whilst managers and supervisors sit on their haunches. Its frightening to think how many of these cases get 'swept under the carpet' as not everyone has access to social media platforms. This unethical business practice is shocking and there is a serious lack of accountability and communication between their departments. I am most disgusted with their service and will never consider any future business with them or recommend their services to any potential mobile user. Is there someone that can assist?

Good day I upgraded my cellphone approx 2 months ago, this was done telephonically, I received my first bill which was R1630.28, I queried this as my bill in all the years I have been with cell has never been more than R350, I was informed that a recording would have been made of the conversation with me and the consultant when I did my upgrade, I queried for the first time on the 19 October 2015 concerning this matter and have queried it everyday ever since (proof can be provided). I was told that they are urgently working on my problem and would get back to me before the debit order date the 25 October, this did not happen and I paid R450 of the bill. I also ask that the new bill for November would have the same problem as October and was also told this would be sorted. Today I received my November Bill which is R1760 plus the R1188 that I am according to Cell c in arrears of the previous month. I have asked on many occasions to hear the recording where cell c says the consultant told me that my limit will be R15000 and asked me if I would like to limit my limit. as I do not recall this part of the conversation. Every time they have new excuses that it was either an external company or they simply can't find the recording. My next debit order date in the 25 November 2015, and I would like confirmation that this will be sorted by then. I have still not received help, and am still waiting for the call recording. Because of this I now have to go and change all my banking details as The debit amount will be R3000 on the 25 November 2015, please understand that this is a great problem for me. I received a call on the 10 November 2015 Ref [protected], the lady promised she would get back to me regarding the call recording, then again on the 17 November Ref [protected] (mandla) also said he would get back to me that afternoon, I am still waiting. No one at Cell C is willing to help with this, and cannot produce my recording

I upgraded my Cell C contract in August 2015. I received the Samsung S6. Approximately 2 weeks after the device was received it started going faulty. Whenever it was charged it would go very hot and the device would just switch off. This was intermittent as it sometimes worked for a week without it happening. On 14th October I lodged a complaint with Cell C. The device was collected from me on the 21st October. I received an sms on 2 November ( ref: CLC1236349) stating that the quote for the repair to the devcie was R4101.74. I contacted the call centre to query what the fault was and was told that the main pc board and another one had corroded. I queried what this was caused from and the agent stated that he did not know. I explained that i had never misused or damaged the phone. I asked whether he was stating that it was water damage and he said no. I requested for the supervisor to contact me as i did not agree to this and it was a brand new damaged phone. The supervisor contacted me and stated, contrary to what the agent had advised, that it was water damage. I totally disagree as this device has never in any way been damaged by water or any other liquid. I also find it strange that the fault occurred almost immediately after receiving it. I wish the device to be replaced with a new one and my account to be credited as I have not had the phone for a 3 week period now.

This is my third request I`m sending through to Cell C customer service and obviously I am not getting any response or feedback from anyone, tried calling in and I`m still holding for more than 40 minutes no one attending my call. I`m getting impatient and annoyed with the courier service company(ram) that you are utilising to deliver my package, I`ve been receiving text messages from Wednesday the 14th of Octoober 2015 advising that they coming to deliver but no one pitched till today. I clearly advised and communicated that I`m starting at 04:00 and knocking off at 14:00 so they have to deliver before then but they still come after time, yesterday I decided to stay behind after receiving an sms that they`ll be delivering and still no one showed up, one their customer service agent called me to tell that their Driver/courier was here at 14:30 which is totally lies because I was still here waiting for them, he then put me through to the driver who honestly told me that he didn’t come(that was at around 14:30), he kept me waiting and promised that he will be with me by 17:00 but that never happened. Remember I had to leave by 14:00 and I ended up leaving at 17:30 waiting for their courier who lied to me as well as their customer service agent, this is a very disappointing and pathetic service I received from them which I`ll never recommend anyone to utilise them. I`m going to take my complaint to “Hello peter” and other social media for their poor service. Looking forward to hear from you.