Two more weeks of call centre hell for 2degrees customers

2degree is making progress after a software upgrade went wrong, but customers still face another couple of weeks of long call centre queues, director of corporate affairs and wholesale Mat Bolland says.

The telco brought on 20 extra helpdesk staff last week and has another 60 coming on board this week, Mr Bolland says.  That represents a one-third expansion of the usual support team – albeit a temporary one.

The reinforcements were brought in after customers faced helpdesk wait times of up to an hour or more.

The grief began in late February when the company upgraded its CRM (customer relationship management software).

The upgrade was meant to allow 2degrees to introduce new products more quickly and to enhance self-service options via its website and its app for iOS (iPhone and iPad) and Android.

However, there was widespread confusion when the upgraded app asked for customers to log-on using a (previously unrequired) email address. Many had never registered an email address with 2degrees. Others had but could not remember which email they used.

And Mr Bolland admits the app just simply didn’t work for some, regardless.

Many hit 2degrees helpline, which quickly became overloaded (and over the past week, the heavy rain in the north – which bombed Spark – has not helped).

Worse, the software upgrade also delayed the telco’s usual billing cycle. Mr Bolland says every billing cycle causes a number of customers to “raise issues.” In this case, several billing cycles have been run unusually close together as the telco plays catch-up, causing an attendant spike in complaints.

2degrees is refusing to name the CRM vendor involved – but it seems not to spare its blushes, however in a tacit acknowledgment that 2degrees stuffed-up planning around the email log-on issue.

“It's our issue. We’re owning it. We’ll sort it,” Mr Bolland says.

He says the website and iOS versions of 2degrees’ self-service system are now behaving, following another upgrade this morning. He’s less sure about the Android version.

2degrees customer Paul Alexander comments, "While the app is working on iOS, I still having issues where I can't see most recent bill. When they emailed me my latest bill, they still showed last month's bill as unpaid despite me paying it three weeks earlier."

On February 28, 2degrees offered all customers a half-gigabyte mobile data credit as a make-good.

To restore customers' humour, it may have to throw a few extra gigs on top.

"Half a gig is pitiful for what we have had to deal with," Mr Alexander says.