the spam text epidemic among Globe Telecom subscribers and Globe’s anti-Globe-subscriber red tape non-solution

there is an epidemic of spam texts that has been infecting Globe Telecom subscribers, both post-paid and pre-paid subscribers. you know the epidemic exists because you are a victim yourself, you read about the complaints to Globe on Twitter and in fact if you read any of the Globe accounts on twitter like the @Talk2Globe account, you can read that most of the complaints are on spam text.

there are now two kinds of spam texts that have been hounding Globe subscribers.

the first one is the “Ad & Services Spam Text“. these are texts that sell you something – a product or service. the products are mostly condo units, some kind of insurance or medical service.  the most rampant ones are sent by Ayala Land and Megaword, two of the country’s biggest property developers. insurance and medical services were mostly sent by Caritas. In fact Caritas was even featured in Philippine news as apparently it sent the most number of spam that some lawsuit  or complaint with the government agencies have been filed against Caritas.  

the second spam text is the more dangerous one for Globe subscribers as this one is criminal – this is the “Scam Spam Text” . this is not just dangerous, this kind of spam text can be very costly to subscribers, it is a scam where the sender intends to fool the Globe subscriber to send the scammer through Globe’s “pasa load” facility. “pasa load” is the facility where one can send a cash value to another subscriber. that cash value is charged or added to the sender’s cellphone bill and the recipient in effect receives a cash value that can be used to pay for cellphone consumption. it is like a money transfer from one’s bank account to another bank account.

this kind of spam text goes over beyond the inconvenience of getting unwanted text from someone who wants to sell you something. this one is an attempt to steal money from you.

ans example of this is this one:

@Talk2GLOBE disable +639261264979 and +639261267812 #StopSpamText pic.twitter.com/QCh9XzmyjE

— WAWAM (@wawam) November 7, 2014

the Scam Spam Text has several components :

• the text sender pretends to be from Globe Telecoms or the text was sent by Globe itself, from “Globe Postpaid”. this is to make the text appear as legitimate.
• the text claims the receiver or intended Globe subscriber victim of the scam was incorrectly charged of something by Globe like an LTE service, an overcharging on roaming or something else
• to stop or get reimbursed of the incorrect charge by Globe, the intended victim is asked to quickly send a reply text to a number
• there is an instruction how to send the reply text.  this instruction in truth is the code text Globe subscribers use to be able to do a pasa-load. in the above example, 300 means a P300.00 cash value will be sent to the number indicated on the number
• the number that it will be sent to is a different number from the one that sent the scam spam text to the intended Globe sub victim
• once sent, the Globe subscriber victim is charged that amount while the same amount is added to the recipient’s load

we got tired of getting these spam texts. the spam texts are sent at no particular time and some of them even at times when we are resting or in meetings. because we receive the text, some effort is made to get our phone and at least look at who sent the text. that is inconvenient and irritating on its own and it gets worse when you receive a lot of it. they also occupy some memory on our phones. memory is a precious commodity to cellphones. a lot of memory occupied means the phone can lag or slow down. aside from the need to look at the text, it consumes time and effort to delete the spam texts and tag the number of the spam send sender as spam.

tagging the cellphone number as spam effectively blocks that number from sending you text or calling your number. you will not even notice you receive a text or call from the block numbers as they are their calls are automatically blocked or their text automatically and silently sent to the spam folder.

we wanted to do more than just block the numbers of the spammers from our cellphone with the use of the blocking function, we wanted Globe Telecom to do something about it so that the practice is stopped at their system itself. we also knew that there were many more Globe subscribers who are being victimized by the spammers. to do that, we have taken our cause on Twitter (@wawam).

we have been sending screen caps of the offending spam text to the @Talk2Globe twitter account and asking Globe to “disable” the cell phone numbers of the spammers.

at the start of the spam epidemic at Globe, the twitter account handlers of Globe didn’t know how to handle the complaints. we suppose no guidelines were yet set at the start. sometime after, the Globe twitter accounts were asking for proof and netizens started sending them screen caps of the spam text. based on our own experience, Globe twitter account handlers said they will handle it and even said they will be sending warning messages to the spammers.

we sent our tweets that contain the screen caps of the spam text with the hash tag #StopSpamText . we noticed that at some point in time other twitter account users with Globe accounts also used the same hash tag that we started.

recently, we found out that there was a new policy at globe :

we thought this new policy was all wrong, violates the privacy of the victims of spam texts, makes it extra difficult to file a complaint and get action from Globe and tends to favor the offenders, the spam senders and disadvantages the victims. Globe was supposed to protect its subscribers, instead it protects the spammers.

Globe wants the victims of spam text to :

• give Globe through twitter the spam victim’s cell phone number
• for the spam victim to agree for Globe to give their cellphone number to the text spammers the victim’s cellphone number once the spammers dispute Globe’s action on the spammers

we feel the last requirement was the most damaging of them all.

• it violates the privacy of the spam victim. people do not like their cellphone numbers to be given to just anyone and everyone. we only give our cellphone numbers to people we know and only if we like to.
• Globe giving our cellphone numbers to the spammers opens up the possibility of the spam victims being harassed by the spammers. if Globe gives the victim’s cellphone numbers to the spammers, it will be a cycle of harassment and even more spam to be sent by other numbers that the spammers  can use after the old one has been disabled by Globe

we do not see how that requirement will help Globe subscribers who are being victimized by the spammers. Globe fails to see that those who receive spam are actually the victims. the victims are asking help from Globe, for Globe to stop the spammers from further victimizing legitimate subscribers and Globe seem not to be up to helping its subscribers with their problems. instead of helping their subscribers from being victimized by spammers, they are protecting the spammers and in effect allowing the spammers to continue their spamming efforts.

if the spam victimized Globe subscriber does not give his cellphone number to Globe and not agree to allow Globe to give their cellphone number to spammers in case of disputes, Globe will drop the case and not pursue any action on the spammer. that means the spammer in question is left by Globe to continue victimizing Globe subscribers.

we do not understand why Globe is not taking action against the spammers.

• first, the spammers are claiming to be from Globe. that alone should give Globe enough reason to disable these accounts. they are illegally using the Globe brand name and Globe corporate name. it is misrepresentation and misuse of the Globe brand and company name. it is patently illegal.
• not only are the spammers illegally using the Globe brand  and corporate names, they are damaging the brand image of the company and the brand.
• the screen caps of the spam texts is a visual proof of these efforts.
• for sure, Globe has a way to find out in their system if a certain number is sending spam texts to others. Globe should have a record of the texts each number sends. a quick access to the text records of the spammers would show the spam texts.
• even if Globe does not keep a record of the actual texts sent by their subscribers, they can for sure know how many texts each subscriber sends out in a given day. a very high number of outgoing texts at any one time is a clear indication that that number is being used to send spam text
• these are spammers, they send hundreds or thousands of texts to other subscribers in a given day, for sure other legitimate Globe subscribers who are victimized by the spammers do not want to receive spam texts. once a number is reported by at least two (2) Globe subcriber victims, that should be enough for Globe to scrutinize the cellphone number if it is sending out spam texts
• there can be some kind of a computer program that they can develop to do this kind of investigation and analysis. all of this can be automated.

why should Globe eliminate spammers and disable their numbers?

1. they are illegally using the Globe brand name and corporate name, this is illegal.
2. they are not just spammers, they are scammers, they are doing illegal activities. legitimate globe subscribers are being victimized.
3. with rampant text spammers, it makes the Globe experience unpleasant and irritating for their legitimate subscribers. a bad brand experience leads users to transfer to other mobile service providers.

Globe has adapted a very strange policy on spam text. rather than help and fix the problems their subscribers are bringing to them, it is making it difficult for their own subscribers, asks information and agreement from their subscribers that put their subscribers at risk of more harassment and in effect protect and help the spammers who in the first place are doing illegal and irritating activities.

 

Globe Telecom charges subs with “data usage” though unused by subs

in the past two months, my globe mobile has been charged with “data charges”,  P80.00 for one month and the other P90.00.

we had called Globe’s customer service hotline to have the charges reversed. we argued that the owner of the mobile phone is my son, a high school student and spends most of his time in school. he wakes up at 5 am and is in school by 630 am and stay in school until 4 to 5 pm on most school days, he reaches home from 5 pm to 6 pm. use of the cellphone is not allowed in school. not only that, in this particular school, Globe signal is often very weak for calls and text and getting an internet signal from globe is almost impossible. given the prohibition in use of the cellphone and weak Globe signal, data usage in school is an impossibility.

when the student reaches home, we have wi-fi that runs 24/7. at home he has his laptop, an iPad and an iPod Touch that he uses to connect to the internet via wi-fi. it does not make sense that he will use his mobile phone to connect to the internet at home when he has a laptop or an iPad to use. definitely using the laptop or iPad to connect to the internet is much better than his mobile phone.

in net – use of his mobile phone to connect to the internet has no possibility at all in the two places he is often in – his school and his home.

we gave this explanation to the Globe customer service personnel (ID #351759) and he gladly reversed the charges. and just to make sure the same problem does not happen again, we had asked that data connection be disabled on the mobile phone. we did not want to keep calling Globe for the same problem in the future. he told me that data connection was disabled with reference #48438xxxx.

fast forward to the latest month’s bill and what do we find – a new data charge of P85.00!!!

this was shocking! just the previous billing month, we had called Globe to complain and had the data service disabled. we had to once again call Globe customer service (ID#ZTM9xxx) to complain and have the charges reversed! it was precisely the aversion of having to call Globe to have charges reversed that we had the data service disabled and yet here we were needing to do it again. we asked the customer service personnel how that happened and she could not give any explanation.

i have a cousin who had complained about the same data charges on her Globe mobile service. i posted a tweet about it and some told me they had the same problem with Globe.

it has made me think – how many subscribers have Globe charged with unused data charges and got away with it?

let’s do the math – a P90.00 charge per customer for just 1 million subscribers will give Globe an additional P90M in revenues that will go straight to profit! these are “errors’ in billing, no expense for Globe as the subscribers have never used Globe’s data services.  

there are so many things wrong about this. it is plain and simple dishonesty on the part of Globe and victimizing their own subscribers. how many Globe subscribers have ignored these unauthorized charges  in their bills allowing Globe to get away with it? what if Globe made this “billing error” to 2 million subscribers? Globe would be earning at least P180M, a windfall!

there ought to be a law to punish companies like Globe for things like this.

 

corporate greed : telcos with multi billion revenues refuse to refund consumers on overcharging on text

this is the news today – giant telcos Smart and Globe have been overcharging consumers on the text messages they have been sending in the past year to the tune of a total of P1.4B according to the Philippine Daily Inquirer (PDI).

philippine consumers have taken to texting as the most often used way to communicate with each other that the philippines has become the texting capital of the world. the PDI article says filipinos send a total of 20M texts a day or 600M texts a month.

the overcharge is a result of the telcos charging consumers P1.00 per text instead of P0.80 as directed by the NTC (National Telecommunications Commission) effective December of last year.

the order to reduce text costs to consumers was a result of a separate directive by the NTC to reduce interconnection charges. interconnection charges were reduced to P0.15 from P0.35 but the telcos did not pass the savings on to consumers.

the whole idea behind the reduction of interconnection charges was to reduce the cost to consumers but telcos instead decided to pocket the savings and fatten their profits.

(read PDI article in full here: Text overcharging bared)

the telc0s in their interviews are saying they will contest the refund in the courts. in other words, they really want to keep the P1.4B for themselves even though these savings were obtained for precisely the reason of reducing charges to consumers.

what will happen to the telcos if they refund consumers? nothing.

for sure, they will not go bankrupt nor will they loose sleep even for a night, not even during siesta if they give the refund. the P1.4B refund is a mere 0.8% of the combined revenues of  Smart and Globe of P166.8B (source: PDI article). the telcos refunding the consumers will hardly affect their bottom line.

while for sure the telcos will not go bankrupt, it will certainly be appreciated by consumers. around 85% of the philippine population belong to the DE socio-eco classes and that means these are the bulk of the customers of globe and smart. in the first place, it is  this high percentage of the poor being their customers which has made texting the most popular service of the telcos. to the poor, even a few peso savings and in this case in texting cost matters a lot.

happier and appreciative consumers will mean increased usage by the consumers. so in the end it will be a no loss and in fact a gain by the telcos. whatever amount they give to consumers for sure will come back to them in increased usage.  except of course when corporate greed strikes.

wawamTECH: philippine call center agents are the biggest liars in the world

if you have a cell phone service, a dsl service at home or a telephone landline in the philippines, then you have experienced this for sure. it is an experience we all have when something goes wrong with any of these services. and one more thing, it is never a happy experience.

1. “I’ll just put you on hold for 1 to 2 minutes” –  that can be anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes. never once did i wait for just 1 to 2 minutes when i am put on hold.

2. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience” – saying “sorry” is just lip service. if they are truly sorry then they would ask their management to fix things and get things done faster.

3. “I do understand your concern…” – this is a hit and miss thing. you will be lucky if the call center agent dealing with you really know your concern. this is one of those lines the call center agent say just to pacify you or make an attempt to make you feel better.why do they use this line when it really does not work?

4. “I’m sorry, my supervisor is not available now and is attending to another customer.”  – you did follow the procedure by talking to the call center agent, the first line of defense by your service provider. but after some minutes of dealing with the the agent. being patient or checking your anger you give up and ask to speak to the supervisor. the customer asking for the supervisor is something the call center agent does not like. she is supposed to fix your concern and for the customer asking for the supervisor means she has failed in her job to satisfy the customer. the customer asking to speak to the supervisor is a point against the call center agent. that is the reason why every call center agent in the philippines says this lie. it is an attempt to dissuade the customer from doing that.

we have dealt with call centers of US companies, like several banks. online stores and tech companies, we never experience this with them. ask for the supervisor and the supervisor talks to you in a few seconds if not immediately. it is strange that the call center companies that service US companies are able to do this and yet those servicing philippine companies are not while both are manned by filipinos and are based in the philippines.

5. “I will call you back.” – after some excruciating minutes, your problems with the service has been fully understood and recorded. they know admit something is wrong with their service and that the customer needs relief and action. the call center agent says this to make you feel better, to give the impression that they are there to fix things for you, that they want you to be a happy customer.  but they never call back to tell you if the problem has been fixed or not fixed.

often i will ask the call center agent exactly what she/he will do and what will be said when they call back. i ask that several times just to be clear. i also ask them what time will they call back. they will of course not be precise as to what time they will call within the day which is a ridiculous time frame. it’s weird that call center agents think you will actually wait the whole day for their call.

you push and they relent and give a time frame instead – anywhere from within 3 to 6 hours. you push and ask for a shorter time frame. the most you can get is within 2 to 3 hours.

but do they call back? never! again we have not dealt with a call center agent who calls back as promised.

6. “My name is…” – often i find that that names call center agents give of themselves are not their real name and not the name they use when they are on duty. they do this to keep you off track when you call back and complain about the service you get from call center agents.

i know that as i do call back to complain about call center agents who do bad in their handling of customers. i find out they gave you the wrong name as the person i am talking to will usually say they do not have call center agents by that name. worst, i ask the person i am talking to what is the name of the call center agent who entertained my call based on their record and they say a different name.

7. “My ID number is…” –  one of the other things i do is ask for their ID numbers aside from the names of the call center agents i deal with. the ID number is in many ways a better info than their names. but of course you really can’t be sure that is their ID number. they give you this lie for the same reason they lie about their names.

8. “I will do this myslf…” – this is supposed the  ace in the conversation with a call center agent. this is meant to reassure you that something will be done to fix the problem you had called them for. they are saying here that they will not just make a report and wait for someone to fix your problems but they will take action themselves. don’t believe this, it ain’t gonna happen.

this is a really sad affair not only for these telco companies but for the philippine call center industry as a whole. the philippine BPO industry is supposed to tbe the leader in the world and wants to not only maintain that status but grow it even bigger and faster but behavior like this, the lies that say to customers is not going to get them there.

the other despicable thing about this is that this happens a lot with call centers of telcos like Globe and PLDT (DSL). these are communication companies and yet these examples show they are bad communicators. the worst kind of communication are the ones that lie to customers.

i say it again, why is that filipino call centers handling philippine companies behave so differently and so badly compared to filipino call centers handling US companies? aren’t they the same company and son’t they follow the same metrics of performance and philosophy?

why this is happening is the next topic in this blog.

wawamTECH: globe handyphone service failing for months now, collapses metro manila wide on the weekend

if you are a globe handyphone subscriber, you have been experiencing this – you are unable to make or receive calls and text on certain days, with the signal meter on your cellphone fluctuating from zero  to two bars. this has been happening for months now.

you have learned to live with it, on occasions cursing globe as  you get texts on your cellphone from 30 minutes to 3 hours late. calls made are not any better – you get a “the party you are calling cannot be reached” error message or others calling you hearing the same message. if you are able to connect to a party, the line is choppy with sounds garbled and disconnections happen often.

if you have been a globe handyphone subscriber for sometime, you know that calling their hotline to complain is not worth the trouble to do.  it will not result to anything. the wait is very long when you call and if you are able to talk to a customer service agent, all you get is a promise to fix it but nothing much happens.

the next best thing is you send a tweet to @enjoyglobe and/or @talk2globe. after some minutes, one of those accounts will reply and ask you to DM (direct message) your cellphone number, your cellphone brand and your locati0n to them. you tweet back – “i can’t send you a DM because you are not following me”. (lol).

any person who has a twitter account know that you can only send a DM to people who follow you. but that appear to be unknown to the globe customer service person handling the globe twitter account.

you also know it will not amount to anything so you do not reply. after some minutes, the globe twitter account replies to you that it is true there are network problems in your area and that they are doing something to resolve the problem. that is of course a lie as the problem really does not get resolved for a few days.

you are of course relieved when it gets resolved and you are able to receive and send texts and calls again. but that does not last for a long time as the problem re-occurs again.

after happening at least twice, you get tired tweeting about it and you just console yourself in reading on twitter that many other globe subscribers are complaining about the same thing you are complaining about. you are not alone, the globe service failure happens all over metro manila, repeated many times in all areas and to many globe subscribers.  you wonder, is there a rotating schedule on this one?

what is happening to globe?

globe is indeed having service problems and what is causing this service outages is a very noble reason – globe is upgrading their system.

now, that does not make sense to most of us. if they are upgrading their system, why has the service deteriorated? an upgrade means service will be better but in the case of globe, service has become not only bad but really very, very bad in this upgrade effort of theirs.

we know globe is upgrading its service. post paid subscribers have received at least 2 letters from globe together with our bills saying they are upgrading their network. from what i remember, the first letter from globe came from a vice president or division head then the most recent basically the same letter but this time signed by mr. ernest cu, CEO of globe.

both letters said globe is presently doing a massive upgrade of their systems and spending multi million pesos (meant to be impressive) to do so and that it will be completed within the next 6 months or so. aside from those two letters, globe also released a series of small newspaper print ads saying the same thing.

the truth is, and it is something that globe has not said is that the service failures is being caused by their upgrade efforts.

globe has actually contracted chinese telecom company Huawei to do the upgrade. Huawei was supposed to install new hardware into thousands of globe cell sites around the country. this new hardware is meant to make the globe system faster,  handle more load for them and enhance data handling.

Huawei, a chinese company apparently won in a bidding for this upgrade versus other suppliers like those based in japan and europe. not only did  Huawei submit the lowest bid price, it also promised everything to globe, including the moon and the stars. whatever globe asked, Huawei granted.

globe fell in love with the cheap bid and the amazing moon and the stars promises and awarded the project to Huawei. well, globe soon found out that a cheap bid means you get even cheaper hardware and service. Huawei apparently over promised in their bid and globe for some reason believed them hook, line and sinker.

Huawei simply did not move fast enough to install the hardware in the globe cell cites. they did not want to hire the required number of engineers to install them quickly and properly. (of course, as their margins will be depleted.) not only that, the hardware were also not performing well as promised  and in many cases were incompatible with the existing globe hardware already in place in their cell sites.

this whole scenario is causing the whole globe system major hiccups, thus the frequent, wide and rotating outages of the globe service. problems keep popping up everywhere and anywhere. based on the frequent outages, it looks like very little has been resolved, many months after they started.

the whole situation is so bad that globe has threatened if not has already taken legal action against Huawei. Huawei is chinese and apparently communicating with them has been very difficult for globe and that is not just because of the language barrier. it is also cultural and business ethics that is separating and in fact clashing between globe and Huawei.

that is what has been happening in the past months. but what happened over the weekend?

apparently the globe system collapsed metro manila wide over the weekend – people from all over metro manila complained signals fluctuated from zero to 1 bar, often no service. calls could not be made or received. texts were received many hours late or not at all received.

we experienced that ourselves over the weekend. family members and friends were in different parts of metro manila and we could not call each other and texts were not received or grossly delayed. at varying times of the day, these friends and family members were in makati, taguig, pasig, quezon city, mandaluyong and manila and had the same complaint. twitter showed the same thing.

we had tweeted to @talk2globe last september 1 and the above was their reply confirming there were network problems in san juan. note at the bottom, @TheMallOfAsia account also tweeted problems with globe.

today, monday many more netizens in twitter complained about what happened to the globe service over the weekend. as a concession to the complaints, globe released a memo on their website admitting of the problem on the globe service over the weekend and offered a rebate to subscribers in that area. (click here : http://blog.globe.com.ph/2012/09/temporary-disruption-in-south-manila-last-september-1/)

there are a few things about this announcement:

• globe admitted that there was a network service outage over the weekend
• although globe was not completely honest here as the areas were not just limited to those few areas (southern manila) but practically the whole of metro manila. they did confirm via their tweet that to me that the san juan service was out too. plus the experiences of friends and family who were in the areas i had mentioned, including The Mall Of Asia in Pasay City based on their own tweet.
• the offer of a rebate was a nice gesture but we wonder how that will be done and if this was an honest effort  to make amends. that rebate announcement is very difficult to implement plus grossly unfair to all other subscribers not living in those areas but experienced the same outage.
• what will globe do? give rebates to subscribers only to those whose billing address are in those areas?
•  what about subscribers who do not have their  billing address in those areas but were contacting those living there and were unable to? they were also inconvenienced but no rebate?
•  what about those with billing addresses outside of those areas but were in those places and experienced the outages?

the promise of the rebate to make amends, being short in reality and impossible to implement fairly will not do anything to soothe the already battered globe subscribers. on top of that, it is really short of specifics.

if i were globe, to make this right i would offer rebates to all globe subscribers not just to a specific area. fact is there is no way to determine whether subscribers living in a specific area are the only ones affected. relatives of those living in southern manila but are in other parts of metro manila and even the rest of the country have been inconvenienced too. for sure those living in souther manila have relatives and friends living say in davao or baguio for example who were unable to contact them because of the service outage.

if i were globe, i would give 2 free text days or each subscriber receive 200 free texts as a rebate or a gesture of goodwill on their network problems during the weekend. point is it needs to be network wide, all subscribers and it needs to be meaningful.

what caused the weekend metro manila wide outage?   apparently a major hardware literally collapsed during the weekend. this hardware was like a central system that processes all the texts and calls made to and from all of metro manila. it was something like the central hub for metro manila calls and texts.

we do not know why it collapsed. worst, we do not know why globe had no back up system or some redundancy system for failures like these. the globe system seems to be so fragile, ill conceived and poorly designed. it is shocking considering this is ayala owned to whom funds is not a problem and it is a major telecom company in the country.

will what happened during the weekend repeat itself? well, yes. there seem to be no guarantee that it will not. besides what happened in the weekend was on top of that has been happening in the past months on the Huawei upgrade failures. this was just an add on. that means globe subscribers will continue to suffer.

globe telecom’s loyalty and rewards program that creates disloyalty

marketing 101 says loyalty and rewards programs are very effective tools in keeping subscribers happy with your service and more importantly to stay loyal. that means loyalty and rewards programs are meant to prevent existing subscribers from cutting off their subscription with the company and switch to a competitor.

it is also much more cost effective to keep customers loyal than to look for new subscribers. marketing and acquisition costs for new customers is much higher and much more difficult for companies.

what makes all of these critical is that the mobile phone service industry is probably the most competitive mass consumer market  in the country.  we know this with the unending and heavy advertising and promotions launched by the top three competing companies – sun, globe and smart.

the three competing companies offer unique plans and a full range of options for the consumers to choose from. many of these are value packed, offering very low cash outlay and monthly fees. when the market already competes on price, you know that the market is reaching maturity and is already near saturation point.

the market is also reaching near-saturation point where a large part of the demographics, in practically all segments already own a cell phone and already subscribe to a mobile service provider.

what this tells you is that a mobile phone service provider’s way to market share and revenue growth is to (1st) keep your current customers loyal; (2nd) increase usage of loyal customers through more value added services and (3rd) gain new users.

what is the point then that globe has kept it’s loyalty and rewards program secret from it’s subscribers?

we have been getting some feedback from a yahoogroup we are a member of.  members are saying the loyalty/rewards program of globe has been there for a long time, it’s just that they don’t tell their subscribers about it. you only get to know about it by accident – from friends or when you call their hotline number and accidentally ask about it.

apparently, smart is less secretive about their loyalty/rewards program. smart puts it in fine print on your cell phone bill to let you know about it. it is in fine print but at least you are told about it. globe does not put it anywhere in your bill and  they don’t tell you about it when you call them. you get to know about it only when you ask them about it.

for me, keeping the loyalty/rewards program a secret from subscribers indicates insincerity. why would you develop a rewards/loyalty program when you don’t intend to let your customers know about it? keeping it a secret from subscribers is very much equivalent to not having one.

we are familiar with rewards/loyalty programs  – the SM group has one, mercury drugstore and national bookstore as well. these stores publicize it with posters and their cashiers ask you if you have one. if you don’t , they will ask you if you want to get one. to these stores, it’s not a secret they actively recruit members to it.

the most obvious negative effect of keeping it a secret from subscribers is that the program is not being used as a tool the way it is intended to be used. not having a lot of subscribers using it also says the program is not achieving it’s objectives.

there is a feedback given in the yahoogroup we are a member of  –  this subscriber has been with globe for a long time, since year 1 of globe operations in 1996. she accidentally found out about globe’s loyalty/reward program from a friend. she calls the hotline number  to inquire about it and globe did not even apologize for not letting her know about its existence. disappointed, she closed her globe account and switched to smart. since she moved over to smart, she has gotten 2 new cell phones as her reward and is very happy with smart.

in that incident, the loyalty/reward program that was kept a secret actually caused disloyalty from a subscriber. it achieved the exact opposite of what it is supposed to achieve.

we know that smart telecoms monitors their churn numbers on a daily basis. churn is the result of subtracting the number of subscribers dropping the service versus the number of new subscribers joining the service.  having a positive churn means the total number of subscribers is increasing while a negative churn means the number of subscribers is shrinking. a positive churn means increasing market share of number of users while a negative churn is a decrease in market share.

to smart telecoms, it’s important that they continue to grow in market share. a negative churn turns them into a panic and will immediately launch new programs to entice new users or keep existing ones.

that is the kind of marketing that smart does and it shows as smart continue to be the dominant mobile service provider in the country.

smart has an interesting history. smart actually built their market through very aggressive marketing.

smart was not the market leader when they started in the market. piltel which was still owned by pldt and separate from smart was the market leader. globe entered the market and took leadership away from piltel. through aggressive marketing, smart over took both piltel and globe and since that time, smart has not only sustained it’s leadership, it has achieved dominance.

in case globe is wondering why they are unable to get switchers from smart subscribers, perhaps the answer can be deduced from this incident – smart does not keep their loyalty/rewards program secret from their subscribers, they tell them about it. smart users  are loyal subscribers because they are hooked by their loyalty/rewards program.

on the other side, in case globe is wondering why  they keep losing their post-paid clients to smart – it is probably because they have kept their loyalty/rewards program a secret from their subscribers.

the globe handyphone experience – when customer relations hot line service is not hot and a disservice

there was a time not long ago getting some customer service  was very difficult. if something goes wrong with the telephone service you subscribe to, it was not easy to get it resolved. first you might not know what number to call. if you get connected to someone, that might not be the person who can help you. if you talk to somebody, it will take a long time to get it resolved.

a silver bullet called customer relations service was invented. companies have set up these with the thinking it is  best from a  business standpoint  to satisfy an existing customer and prevent that customer from dropping your service or product and move to competition.  studies show that it is much more costly and much more difficult for a company to get new users or customers than keeping an existing one. the thinking is that you do your best to prevent your customers from dropping your service to move to other companies. this is much easier to services like a mobile service  than products like toothpaste or shampoo. service companies have the luxury of talking directly to their customers, making customer retention an easier task.

modern marketing is also a very competitive one. two to three competing companies are fighting for the same customer. when a current customer is already using your product/service, it will be much easier to convince that customer to stay on since he/she already has experience with your product/service. converting a new customer puts you on stage 1 of the product preference cycle not to mention your competitors are most likely also going after the same customer.

pair the idea of customer relations with another emerging trend called the call center makes it even more potent. with call centers, dispensing customer relations will be much more efficient, makes it standard and more importantly very quick. this pair builds more loyal customers.

or at least so goes the theory.

that is the theory part because in practice, in this case with globe handyphone in particular, that might not be true at all and has the effect of the exact opposite.

we have been experiencing globe handyphone’s customer service hotline in the past weeks and this is where we are:

• the first call we made to globe handyphone’s hotline service was on march 20. it has been unresolved as of this writing – now  30 days.
• since march 20, to follow-up, we have made a call to the hotline number at least 14 days out of  the 30 days for an average of 1 call every other day.  since april 1, this was more frequent with calls almost on a daily basis. the average will go much higher if you subtract 4 days from the total because of the holy week period when there  was no work.
• we have accumulated a total of 6 reference numbers on the same topic and complaint
• we have on file the names of at least 16 call center agents and 4 supervisors  (with their corresponding ID numbers),  in total at least 20 who we have talked to on the phone
• we have talked to 3 supervisors who promised me they will call me back within the day to tell me when someone will call me but he/she never did

obviously, the globe handyphone customer service hot line is a failure in my case.  i have been calling them for the same problem for 30 days now and it continue to be unresolved. some observations:

• i don’t understand why they need to give me a separate reference number every time i call when it is exactly the same topic.  towards the end, i refused to accept a new reference number as having a new one gives it a more recent time stamp and just delays the call back time aside from the fact that it is just confusing.
• every time i called them, they will tell me someone will call me within 3 to 5 working days.
• first, i don’t understand why it will take them 3 to 5 working days. taking a full work  week i think is just too long.  that is extremely slow service specially when it is to resolove a problem. it will take half a day to stop subscription and move to another mobile company.
• saying each time someone will call you in 3 to 5 working days just extends the period. they actually never called back. it has been 12 working days since april 1 and no one has called me back yet. it has been 11 working days since april 2 and no one has called me back either.  the list goes on.
• the call center agents keep asking me for my number where they can call me back. this question kills me and is most irritating.  i am a subscriber to their cell phone service why will they not know how to call me? is my cell phone number not in their record? i have also given them my landline number a long time ago, they did not keep that on file?
• that is the same problem with my email address. one of the agents asked for my email address. i gave it to them but 5 days after, talking to another call center agent, she asks me again for my email address. that means the first person who asked me the info did not file it in their system.
• what is the point of asking a customers for their contact numbers and email address when they don’t bother to save it in their system?
• they also have this habit of asking for the past history of the calls when these are supposed to be recorded in their system.  we would be asked when and with whom we  have talked to during previous calla.
• instead of answering, we asked  them – do you have my file open on your monitor? a few would say yes. most will ask for 30 seconds to open my record on their computer. i don’t understand this – why would they not open my record at  the start of the call?
• then i ask another question –  can you not see the history of my calls on your computer screen? the answer is yes sir, it’s here. so we ask – why are you asking that question when you will know the answer just by looking at your computer screen? no reply. then change topic.

customer relations dispensed through call centers is supposed to make customer servicing much more efficient and quicker. my experience so far with globe handyphone is it is mostly inefficient and very much slow. the whole system simply does not work nor is it giving globe the speed and efficiency they were supposed to get in investing in computer systems and hiring or outsourcing call center services.

neither are their customers happier and more satisfied with their service. if at all this customer is angrier and more disappointed at the kind of service they were giving us. we have been a globe handyphone customer for the past 11 years and never missed paying a single monthly bill. this is my first major call to them that is service related. we have made  no more than 4 calls within that 11 year period. globe is making a lot of money out of my subscription to their service – monthly bills paid on time for 11 years and with only 5 calls made to their call center. we are not a bother to them and we pay them good money.

the systems they have put in place, the customer service and call center facility is meant to make things easier and faster for customers, our experience with them so far is anything but fats and efficient.

the above customer service experience is just on the first level in resolving the issue we have brought to them. apparently there is another department who is in charge of resolving the issue. unfortunately it is this other department that has been very unresponsive.

all the call center agents and supervisors we have talked to have said they have sent urgent requests to have my issue resolved by that other department.  it is also the other department who is supposed to call me about my problem.  it looks like the continuing problems i have been encountering with them is being caused by that other department.

the name of the department — the Loyalty Group or the Customer Relations Management.

we think it is the ultimate irony that the department who has been unresponsive to a customer relations complaint is the one in charge of “loyalty” and “customer relations”.

the experience so far, for the past 30 days is one that does not inspire loyalty to globe handyphone on our side nor do we think their non-action and unresponsiveness is good “customer relations”.  for sure the mission of the department is to “build loyalty” among current customers and  to “ensure good customer relations” among subscribers.

with this performance and the way they have set up their system – what then is the point of putting up a “loyalty group” and a “customer relations group”?

tomorrow will be 31 days of unresolved loyalty and customer relations for us.

update : globe’s iphone 3G philippine launch

long lines were not formed, and it looks like there were few subscribers who bought the iphone. not enough advertising? wrong pricing?

 read more about it here : http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/

globe telecom’s philippine launch of the iphone 3G – The Top 13 Serious Questions Serious Buyers Of The Iphone Should Ask Globe

it’s a serious investment, specially considering you know the iphone is insanely over-priced. there are 13 questions you need to ask globe before you leave the globe store with your iphone. read about them here : http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/

globe handyphone gives up chance to market leadership

globe’s marketing plan behind the iphone launch in the philippines seem to say they’re not interested in gaining market leadership over smart. view it here : http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/

globe telecom will launch the iphone 3G in the philippines, do they have what it takes to push to leadership?

globe telecom, the 2nd largest mobile service provider in the philippines is the carrier of the iphone 3G in the philippines.

what will globe do with the iphone 3G? will they use it as a whiner or will they use it as a winner?

smart telecom has always been the more aggressive one and globe appearing to be too conservative and too cautious. with a success like the iphone 3G,  does globe have the  heart and the smarts to get the iphone push them to market leadership?

read it all here: http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/