A bit rich, even for Platinum

It's bad enough to upset loyal customers, but another matter entirely when you upset those you don't even do business with.

It's bad enough to upset loyal customers, but another matter entirely when you upset those you don't even do business with.

That's why the number and nature of complaints against Cape Town-based Platinum eProducts is so concerning; most come from consumers who know nothing about the company or its products.

Platinum eProducts is an e-commerce business providing "lifestyle-enhancing products and services" to a low-income market. These include mobile communications, and finance and assurance, sold mainly through direct marketing via cellphone.

Platinum says the number of complaints against it is small and that most of its 100000 customers are happy. But Durban domestic worker Happy Khumalo - along with at least 100 other consumers who've vented on consumer website hellopeter.com - certainly aren't among them.

The main gripe is that Platinum debits bank accounts without consent, is slow to admit fault and even slower to pay out promised refunds. Other accusations include misleading information, poor complaints resolution and failure to explain processes and costs.

Pinetown-based Khumalo was one of the luckier ones. When Platinum debited her Absa account five times in July and August this year - three times in just one day - for almost R1000, there were no funds available to be taken.

Said Khumalo: "When I asked Absa about it, the woman there indicated that this happened quite frequently and was most probably for a micro loan. I have never taken a micro loan from any institution."

When her employer tracked down Platinum's collections agent, IntelliCollect, it admitted Khumalo was not a client and that "some person in Amanzimtoti" had provided her banking details. This person had purchased the company's MoneyCall and TeleCash products. MoneyCall is a three-month cash-in-hand plan based on consecutive successful weekly debit orders, and TeleCash is a revolving credit line for small cash advances, accessible via telephone, and repayable on the next pay day.

IntelliCollect customer relations manager Marelize Kleyn said a person presenting Khumalo's banking details as his own had entered into a telephonic agreement with Platinum eProducts.

She said the company always verified that bank accounts given belonged to the ID number given. She attached the "relevant voice mandate" - a recorded conversation between the customer and the company's call agent that constituted the agreement.

It rang two alarm bells. First, the rapid-fire speed at which the agent spoke rendered what was being said unintelligible. There was no way the client could have heard, much less understood, the detailed terms and conditions rattled off.

When the Consumer Protection Act comes into effect next April, companies that employ unfair tactics or take advantage of a customer's illiteracy, ignorance, or inability to understand the language of an agreement will be guilty of "unconscionable conduct".

Second, the identity and cell numbers the client provided were not Khumalo's; only the bank details were hers. So much for Platinum's verification process.

When asked to explain, Platinum's Annarica Allison said the company had not done an account verification when the client had bought a second product and swopped his legitimate bank details with Khumalo's.

"The AV was not done the second time, mainly because it is not the norm that a client provides us with invalid information.

"Checking existing clients' details is now standard practice ... we are constantly amending and enhancing our debit-order collection process in an attempt to perfect it," said Allison.

And the dodgy recording?

"Upon listening to the voice tag of the telephonic transaction, it is immediately apparent that she (the agent) is discussing processes that she herself clearly does not understand and it is unacceptable that she does not allow time (for the client) to ask questions," she said.

She said the company's target market was mainly South Africans whose financial needs were not addressed by existing financial institutions or government. Most such people, she said, had no credit record, fixed assets, or long-term security in respect of employment. Many did not have registered addresses or named roads, nor postboxes or land lines.

"All they really have, is a cellphone and it is largely due to the emergence of this technology that we are able to offer the wide range of services we do," she said.

So they're also soft targets for exploitation?

Definitely not, said Allison. It was "inaccurate" to view this group as "wholly unsophisticated and easily exploited victims of big business". In fact, sometimes "advantage" was taken of the company because of its no-penalty policy for defaulters.

"It would be a pity if we were made a whipping boy based on what seems to be a large number of complaints, when many, upon analysis, are nebulous and largely of the variety that I have experienced and complained about with other service providers," she said.

The company, which is awaiting registration with the National Credit Regulator, has been questioned by at least two banks and the Department of Trade and Industry in the past. One irate consumer even started a blog complaining about the company.

"We have made mistakes, we admit these openly, but there is no blueprint for what we do - we are creating a new reality in respect of this type of business model, one success and one challenge and even one failure at a time," she said.

Surely one failure is not a problem but 100 are?

"Of the total volume of transactions, the unmandated debit deductions are a fraction of a percentage point," said Allison.

Platinum seems to take a lot of comfort from this. But history shows there's seldom smoke without a fire.

Sunday Smile

At lexmark, which processed a colleague's rebate in record time. The company offers a 30% discount on replacement printers to previously registered Lexmark customers whose broken printers are out of warranty. "I bought another printer for R800 at Game and then faxed Lexmark the receipt. Imagine my surprise when the R240 rebate was in my account within 24 hours!" he said.

Sunday Snarl

At Woolworths, which took more than a week to offer Johannesburg reader Alexandra Norvall a R300 "goodwill gesture" after she bought a worm-riddled pre-cooked chicken and rotten produce at its Northcliff store. Norvall e-mailed her complaint, with supporting photos, to the retailer just hours after her "gross" find. It didn't collect the contaminated chicken, which she'd frozen for testing, until a week later. Will the real Woolies please stand up?