Telstra – Avoid At All Cost’s

At the beginning of this year the company I work for was instructed by its global head office to install a video conferencing suite.  The idea was that this would save several international flights a year, save money and do our little bit towards being green.

As a part of the project process it became apparent that our aging IT and telecommunications infrastructure was just not up to the job.  Lucky for us, the Federal Government stepped in with their corporate stimulus plans to promote investment in new capital works.  Thus our project expanded to include replacing our IT infrastructure as well as beefing up our phone lines and replacing the phone system.

This story focuses on the telecommunications component – and on the running battle we have had with the selected provider – Telstra – ever since.

When we started 2009 we were woefully underequipped.  We had only eight concurrent lines for a business fast approaching 30 people and a phone system so long in the tooth it was getting hard to find new handsets.  It was clear that we would need additional ISDN lines to run the video conferencing system – it made sense to run a large line into the building and split a few channels off for the VC system, something Telstra assured us we could do.

Several companies that pitched warned us to avoid Telstra.  I thought they were just being competitive and trying to put down the incumbent provider.  How wrong I was!

After we elected to remain with Telstra, everything moved along smoothly at first.  We selected a phone system and an Internet plan and waited patiently for the install day.

It was on that day that things began to unravel.  Now I had been clear since the start that we were buying a third party video conferencing  system and had been assured that we could allocate some capacity from the large ISDN connection for it.  This proved to be wrong and we had to keep our old lines.  My protests – and requests for a discounted line rental for these lines fell upon deaf ears.  We wanted to buy a headset for the receptionist.  Our account manager offered to throw one in as a part of the deal.  Six months later we gave up waiting and bought one from a third party supplier.

But these are trivial complaints compared to the matter which I personally consider, frankly, a case of outright theft.  During installation I was asked to look into the possibility of forwarding voicemails to email.  I was told by the installer this would need an extra component – which he confirmed with his boss in front of me.  I emailed our Telstra account manager and asked for a quote and specified exactly what we wanted to do.  He applied for a price from the phone system manufacturer and sent me a quote.  We agreed to the price and ordered the part.

By the time the installer returned to install the additional component he had been on a training course for the phone system and informed me that the additional component was not necessary for our requirement.  He set the phone system up to forward voicemail to email and I contacted our Telstra account manager to arrange a refund for the redundant part.  I thought this would simply be a formality – but it took several weeks before the account manager even collected the component.

We have now been fighting for a refund for some months and finally Telstra came back with an offer to refund half the price of the component – the remainder we had to pay as a restocking fee.  This for something that would fit in your pocket.

If this was just a couple of hundred dollars it wouldn’t really matter – but the fact is we are talking about thousands of dollars.  From a financial perspective I was congratulated at work for finally managing to get some of the money back – but personally I feel  that I have been taken for a fool.

We bought a component we were told we needed by Telstra’s installer.  I made it crystal clear to our account manager what we wanted to do.  I feel that if he knew – or the manufacturer knew – that we did not need the part, it was beholden on them to tell us.  When it became apparent that we had been sold a bill of goods we should have immediately received a full refund, no questions asked.

Now if this was all hearsay one might give Telstra the benefit of the doubt – but I have the whole debacle documented – right through to the offensive emails I received from the local Telstra sales manager when I had the temerity to suggest that we would complain to the industry ombudsman if a refund was not forthcoming.

In conclusion, when our contract expires Telstra will be excluded from the business for evermore.  I will be removing Telstra services from my home and telling everyone who will listen what crooks they are.  It will end up costing them far more that the $2400 they refused to refund.  A foolish way to do business!

Update: We did eventually receive the cheque for the 50% refund – it took another month after a refund was agreed.  When I chased this delay it was suggested to me that they didn’t know where to send the cheque.  I put it to them that perhaps the same place they sent the bill would be appropriate!

Some weeks later the Sales Manager came to see me and I thought we had finally straightened things out and we would see some action.  Nearly three weeks has since passed and we are getting nowhere again.