This is email from Heng:
Lately, many Telecoms Malaysia customers are forced down their throats to have a new voice mail message service without even the customers requesting for it. I believe this is part of a scheme to meet the so called KPI of the GLC’s. This service is a nuisance to many customers. The calling party shall be charged for futile calls and the receiving party shall be billed for retrieving the messages.
I hope as a YB, please look into this issue or if this is a minor issue to you as you have to handle other major national issues, please get someone to handle this issue for the benefits of Telecoms Malaysia customers.
What say you?
Even if they don’t ask us to pay, it is really a nuisance to me. I don’t need a voice mail for my home phone and I certainly don’t want this so-called add-on or my homephone.
We were not informed. I dont see any billing for it. Is it a test run? After which when we get comfortable with it we get charged for it?
We should have been given an option whether to agree to it or reject it. No such letter came. I would like Telecoms Malaysia to treat its customers with a little more repsect.
this is a nuisance service.i had to call in to cancel this service.
my sister did the same. i cannot understand why they installed it in the 1st place. whats more the service kicks in after the 1st ring. isn’t that ridiculous.
another case of monkeys running the country. initiating this service this way just brings unnecessary criticism and is unproductive when customers demand them to remove the service.
last time when the phone engage, i just need to call back later. now Telekom charge me for nothing that i want. This is how they get extra income. Even my h/p also deactivated the voice mail, why we need that service ?
I agree with Heng.
We don’t want anything that we never request. Please, no more blood sucking scheme on us the poor ‘rakyat’. We’ve been sucked almost dry by the rise of living expenses.
Kit, please voice our concern in the parliament.
These telcos have devious schemes to milk customers money. All new phone lines come with this voice mail. If they charge customers say 5 sens every time the voice mail box is reached they will make one million rgt for every 20 million unanswered calls. They do not inform customers on how to terminate this service; most are not even aware that there is such a sevice installed on their lines. Kit, you should speak to minister Lim KY and ask him to ban telcos from installing services which are not requested and involve somone having to pay extra for it. In this case it is the caller as the reciever do not even know his phone has a voice mail.
NO. NO. NO. DEFINITELY NO.
TELCO CANNOT CHARGE WHEN THEY CANNOT PROVIDE A SUCCESSFUL CONNECTION PERIOD!!!
TELCO CAN ONLY CHARGE IF THE CALLER WANTS TO LEAVE A VOICE MESSAGE AFTER PRESSING A NUMBER. THEY MUST BE GIVEN AN OPTION. THEN IT IS ONLY FAIR.
THIS SHOULD BE EXTENDED TO ALL CURRENT CELCOS WITH IMMEDIATE EFFECT.
I say why is Telekom still charging us RM23 for rental of phone? Even mobile telcos have already done away with the access fees due to competitioin. Is Telekom taking us for a ride just becos they hv the monopoly stranglehold on us? Just to use a line for the sake of connecting to the internet, I hv to pay extra rm23 though I hv no usage for the phone line as a means of verbal communication.
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HELP . . HELP . . HELP .. .
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TELL ME . .TELL ME . . TELL ME . .
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HOW TO STOP THAT VOICE BOX SERVICE . .
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PLEASE . .PLEASE . . PLEASE TELL . .
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HOW . . TO DISCONNECT THAT SERVICE . .
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NEXT RESORT . .
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DISCONNECT THAT TM FIXED LINE.. .
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OF NO USE . . . NUISANCE . . . .
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NUISANCE. . NUISANCE. . .NUISANCE. .
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USE HAND-PHONE . . . MORE CONVENIENT . .
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Kit,
Please highlight other relevant issues pertaining to Telcos deception means and craftiness in cheating its subscribers. Little wonder all telcos have been reporting millions of ringgit in profit.
I needed a stremyx broadband connection but I am forced to apply for a phone line for which I am required to pay RM 26.00 in access fee every month. I don’t use this phone at all but still have to pay the access. With my RM 88.00 for the broadband, I am actually paying RM 114.00 each month for my boadband connection.
And one more thing. I signed up for 1 mbps package but I get only half as much. Sometimes the connection is down for days and yet I have to pay the full subcription. What do we do then?
TMNet should charge us on a pro rata basis – only for the days we get the service.
My second issue is this. Prepaid mobile phone users will have their credit forfeited if they fail to top up their credit within 30 days after the expiry of their useage period. The credit balance maybe RM 1.00 or RM 100, it is forfeited. To be this is nothing short of robbery.
In Malaysia, the citizens are fleeced with impunity.
[Lets catalogue all the grouses and complaints about the lousy services of Telekoms Malaysia, including its scandalous broadband services, and I’ll take them up with the telco and the authorities, in or out of Parliament. – Kit]
not enough with charging us monthly RM26 even if we make just RM1 called per month, now they want to suck more from us. But luckily i found out here that i can terminate the voice mail “service?”. On the streamyx issue, i strongly believe that they should drop the promised of “unlimited” when there service is not up to it. Sometimes it is not slow,but no connection at all. Yet we have to pay for it
Add to the above as requested by Kit.
1. If one party does not abide by the terms of the contract, then the contact become void, isn’t it?
In this case, the subscriber should be given the right to terminate the subscription as TMNet has failed to provide the speed agreed to in the contract.
If I want to cancel the subscription TMNet says that I have to pay the full one year’s subscription as I have not fulfilled the compulsory one-year requirement. So the subscriber is bound by the contract not the provider.
In any case why impose a one year compulsory forced subscription.
2. After being a streamyx subscriber for 3 years I decided to upgrade from 512 bps to 1 mbps. The one year condition is again imposed on me. Disappointed with the present speed I decide to revert to my old speed of 512bps and I am told I cannot downgrade until I complete the one year condition. But I have already been a subscriber for three years!!!
What nonsence? This is exploitation of the weak.
3. I understand one reason for the slow speed is due to the “last mile” cable used between the TMNet post (from the roadside) and the residence of the subscriber.
The proper cable to use is the Unshielded Twisted Pair (UTP) but TMNet is using the Shielded Twisted Pair which is cheaper. It is cutting costs at our expense. (You can Google UTP to read more about this cable). I understand alot of speed is lost between these two points.
How long more must msians pay high charges for sub-standard services? The only way to get better services at good prices is through competition.
I begins to suspect the motives to continue hanging on to monopoly. So many countries have benefited by introducing competitions in their telco industry. Even our own mobile services can be a good example although there is still a long way to go.
Are there any corrupted decision makers and their cronies benefiting from the monopoly?
“How long more must msians pay high charges for sub-standard services? ”
Threre can only be one answer: for as long as BN is in power.
What can be done? TM should be told not to ever repeat such underhand tactic to secure more sales volume.
If TM is good in their business, they do not need to resort to such unethical methods for revenue. They should know what is entrepreunership per se. They know monopoly has now slip off their grip, unlike those earlier days where they are the sole supplier of telecommunication services.
If TM has already charged those unsuspecting customers, they should be gracious to return the money to whom they have exploited.
“If TM has already charged those unsuspecting customers, they should be gracious to return the money to whom they have exploited.”
Let buyers beware.
TM is getting greedy by throttling the bandwidth nationwide. A nice article about it was published in The Star : http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2007/2/8/focus/16811744&sec=focusthat
and you can read about the ranting in Lowyat forum:
http://mytorrent.hopto.org/index.php?showtopic=3254
On a side note, does this practice violates the General Consumer Code of Practice for the Communications and Multimedia Industry Malaysia? The “Code” is at this site : http://www.cmc.gov.my/registers/cma/commindcode/pdf/GeneralConsumerCode.pdf
In the States, you pay a one time rate of $40+ and it comes with call waiting and unlimited local calls. Also broadband starts at $14.95 per month for speed up to 768 Kbps. One thing I don’t understand is that why basic utility service is so expensive in Malaysia. Imagine Telekom Malaysia is still charging caller by the units they used. Should it be a basic rate of may be $30 per residential line? Telephone infrastructure has been there for years so there is no excuse for them to say they need the money for infrastructure investment. This is a ripped off by a GLC like Telekom Malaysia. Plus we have been indirectly funding them via the tax money just like Proton. I really feel sorry for all Malaysians that have to endure this burden.
no wonder when i called back hometown, i thought “wah, my mom so hi tech dy, she even install a message recorder on the house phone.” now I know she didn’t install it. it was forced down the throat.
To the US Resident dated 3/3/07 @ 6.02am, the Malaysian culture and standards are still a long long way off compared with that of the US, or for that matter, any other countires other than the US, in the developed/first world.
M’sia is still langguishing in the third world, and in the third world, it is sliding down the ladder of ranking in every aspects of the development, economic, social, political, cultural. Even in efficiency and integrity, it is sliding backward year in year out; similarly in education, the rots continue unabatedly.
What more can the M’sian ask from their government and the GLC? There is no chance for an alternative government in the country, unlike the US and other democratic countries in the developed world. In the US, citizen can throw out a president in 4 years’ time, or throw out a party in Congress and Senate but it is monumental here to ever think of changing the government.
For the last 50 years, it is the same so-called “party” (in Malay, it is called “‘rojak’ party”, consisting a mix of racially-based parties) that rules the country.
Change is something hard to come by in this country, is a rare commodity. Here, you can have chief executive, PM, that can squat on the post for 22 years refusing to budge, also you have rojak parties’ heads that stay on for 20 to 30 years, all self-proclaiming that they are indispensible. Change? is bad.
People are still practising medieval and outmoded way of life and culture and misplacing the priorities to move ahead.
M’sian do appreciate your feeling of sorry for them but then change is hard to come by here. The people are just sitting ducks.
My 012 bill shows that they are also profiting from it!
Voicemail that I don’t want to use but am SUCKED into it.
CHEERS for foolishly trying to pad the bottom-line in futility.
I tested my son’s pre-paid on my fixed-line TM voice-mail and had a RM0-25 reduction on the credit balance to show for.
This is a big-time conspiracy!
I pity the Customer Service Executives fronting for their idiotic bosses.