The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The Bahamas Telecommunications Company’s (BTC) top executive last night pledged to deliver “a best-in-class experience” for all users after complaints that clients were left “in the lurch” by poor customer service.

Sameer Bhatti, BTC’s chief executive, acknowledged to Tribune Business there will be “occasions” when technology fails to function after several well-known customers recently complained they were being billed for communications services they were not receiving, with no information on the problem’s cause or when it would be rectified being provided. One, frustrated after four weeks without home phone and Internet service, said he had given up and switched to Aliv.

Of the trio who spoke at length to Tribune Business about their experience, Mr Bhatti said BTC had been in contact with all three and “resolved” the issues impacting two of them. “We are working with the final customer to ensure those issues are also rectified,” he added.

“Our customers are at the heart of everything that we do, and as a business we are focused on improving our reliability and delivering a best-in-class experience for them. We acknowledge that there will be occasions where man-made technology will falter, as in any industry. However, we strive to keep these instances as minimal as possible.”

Attorney Leandra Esfakis told Tribune Business it was only after she sent a complaining February 20, 2023, e-mail to Inge Smidts, BTC’s chair and head of its immediate parent, Cable & Wireless Communications (CWC), that two phone lines at her Market Street premises for which she paid a deposit in November 2022 were switched on.

In the meantime, she said BTC had been calling to demand payment of around $218 for use of the lines, but had provided no bill so she could understand on what basis the charges had accrued. “They really need to pay more attention to the service end of things rather than the advertising and marketing,” Ms Esfakis told this newspaper.

“It’s all very well to have high-powered marketing people all over the place, but can you provide what you are marketing?” Meanwhile, David Morley, Morley Realty’s president, told Tribune Business he was “left with no alternative” to switch his home phone and Internet business from BTC to Cable Bahamas/ Alive after being a customer of the former since 1995.

After losing both services to his eastern New Providence residence over the last weekend in January 2023, he told this newspaper that he endured a frustrating four weeks trying in vain to obtain an explanation from BTC as to the cause of the problem or a likely timeline for when it would be fixed.

With no alternative solution offered by BTC, Mr Morley added that he ended up porting to its competitor and said: “It’s unfortunately not the BTC we all remember.” Fast, reliable Internet and communications services are vital for Bahamians and businesses to compete in today’s increasingly digital economy, especially given this nation’s position as an international business and financial centre that requires constant connectivity to global clients.

Mr Bhatti yesterday sought to reassure that BTC is addressing the challenges: “We are continuing with our mandate to upgrade our networks and completely ‘fiberise’ our entire network with unmatched speeds and value. More than 70 percent of New Providence has been upgraded to fibre, and during the course of this year, the entire New Providence footprint will be fully fibre.

“Where services have been upgraded, we encourage our customers to also upgrade to fibre for better reliability. Eventually, BTC will only maintain its fibre network, and we will shut down our legacy copper technology. We encourage our customers to reach out to us directly through CALL-BTC (225-5282) or any of our social media platforms. In instances where customers are unable to reach us through these platforms, I invite them to send a note directly to me at btcceo@btcbahamas.com.”

Ms Esfakis, though, in her February 20, 2023, e-mail to Ms Smidts said: “I am a customer of BTC. Unfortunately, my experience is not satisfactory. You may not be aware of the poor service and resulting dissatisfaction with services of BTC on this island. I paid a deposit for phone service on November 22, 2022. Phone lines were connected about second week of January 2023. I do not have an account number.”

She told BTC’s chair that one of the phone lines she was given proved unusable because the number had already been ported to Aliv. Upon visiting BTC’s offices on February 11, 2023, she was given an alternative number but also told that she owed a $307 bill on the two phones.

“I queried how I would have a phone bill of that amount in four weeks, particularly when I did not have the use of one phone during the four weeks,” Ms Esfakis told Ms Smidts. “And I had received no phone bill indicating what was being charged or why. I had not been presented with any packages, nor agreed to any package of charges. The staff member promised to investigate it......

“On Monday, February 13, neither phone would allow calls out. A voice recording on the line says that all calls require a long-distance code. And the phone does not allow phone calls out for actual long-distance calls using an area code. I am now told that the recorded message is a way of cutting off the phone until the phone bill is paid. This week the bill is said to be $218.91. I have not received such a bill.

“BTC lacks an ascertainable contractual basis for the charges and fails to provide the actual service for charges claimed. I put in a formal complaint to BTC on February 14. I received a reference number, 199584 but still no bill, no other response, and no functioning phones. I have called telephone numbers of BTC corporate office without being able to connect,” she added.

“I understand I cannot transfer my phone to another company unless the BTC bill is paid. I need a contract for services; functional phone provided in accordance with the contract; and an invoice for services provided.” Ms Esfakis told Tribune Business that the two phone lines were switched on within 48 hours of her e-mail to Ms Smidts, for which she voiced her gratitude.

However, while an account number has also been provided, up until this weekend there was still no bill for services or contract. Ms Esfakis also revealed she was initially told by BTC there was no infrastructure in the Market Street area to support the installation of phone services, even though her premises was in close proximity to the Central Bank and had been in her family for decades - often being used as a business.

Asserting that BTC were “quite aggressive”, calling and e-mailing every day when her home phone bill was overdue, Ms Esfakis said: “If you go on their website and into any of their outlets, like Sandyport, they’re more interested in selling you a cell phone. They don’t have anybody in the shop that deals with fixed-line or fixed problems. The service part has fallen into a black hole.

“I haven’t gotten a bill. I just have people telling me on the phone it’s over $218. I have no idea on what basis you are charging $218 when I have had four weeks of partial or no service. There’s no measurable basis for that charge. That’s such poor business practice. I don’t know how you can operate a business like that.”

Suggesting that she, too, may follow Mr Morley and switch to Cable Bahamas/Aliv, Ms Esfakis added: “The service they provide, or purport to provide, needs to improve, and accounting and billing needs to improve or get in place.” Referring to BTC’s advertising presence at Lynden Pindling International Airport (LPIA), she added: “It’s all very well to advertise, but if you want to gob smack people when they arrive on tarmac you’ve got to provide better service.

“Why spend so much on advertising when there’s a need for better service. It’s ass backwards. If they had better service perhaps they’d not need to spend so much of their hard-earned dollars in advertising. That’s my take.” Ms Esfakis said BTC had run her twice in 12 hours at the weekend, but when she rang back all she received was a menu of options and no one answered.

Mr Morley, meanwhile, said he lost BTC’s home phone and Internet service on the last Sunday in January and “never saw it again before I was forced to switch to Cable”. He added: “Unfortunately, no one at BTC gave you any indication of what was going on or any timeline except: ‘We expect it to come back on momentarily’. Whether or not they were being told what was happening by the higher-ups, customers were left for themselves in the lurch.”

A BTC representative, communicating with Mr Morley at the time, said of the cause: “I do apologise I can’t give in-depth details but the matter is being looked into and our teams are doing their best to get services back up.” She previously said there was “a power failure where some of our systems are located”, and said it was “a bit more extensive than the others”.

An exasperated Mr Morley said he found it “hard to believe” that BTC did not have stand-by generators, given the frequency of power outages in The Bahamas, and preventative maintenance to mitigate such incidents. “We do apologise for this long wait,” the BTC representative replied, “but they are taking this serious as this affects a lot of our customers but it’s just that the matter is more severe than they thought.”

Mr Morley told Tribune Business that when he returned his modem to BTC’s Mall at Marathon office to terminate the account, it was suggested to him by one of the employees that the outage may have been caused by the theft of fibre and “intentional sabotage” to the carrier’s network. He added that without his girlfriend’s Aliv my-fi, and cell phone ‘hot spot’, he would have been “dead in the water” for communications and BTC had offered no alternative or substitute product.

“I said: ‘It’s unfortunate your customer service is lacking’,” Mr Morley recalled. “I received a bill for February 8 to March 8. How can you expect me to pay for a service that I’m not getting? You have to credit the bill. She [the BTC employee] laughed and said I had a good point.”

Using his cell phone ‘hot spot’ also resulted in him being charged for additional data use. “I said: ‘Why not give me unlimited data until you get the home phone going?” Mr Morley added. “They said apply for that refund and get that going. You’re not giving me any consideration. It’s not how you and I do business.

“For me the most frustrating thing was they’ve got into this cute habit of saying sorry for the inconvenience but there’s no sincerity in what they’re saying. It’s a very superficial line by them.” Meanwhile, businessman Bruce Raine recalled how he paid for the installation of a single BTC landline but did not know if it was switched on or a handset was supposed to come with it.

With no dial tone, and the modem lights not coming on, he reached out to a former employee of his who now worked at BTC. The technician who subsequently visited confirmed that there was no signal to the building, meaning that Mr Raine had been billed $250 for a service he was not receiving as installation was not complete.

“They’re trying hard, but oh my God, they keep tripping over themselves,” Mr Raine said of BTC. “I’ve got at least $500 in incorrect charges. It really is a shambles, an absolute shambles. Nobody knows what they are doing. How many others in that same boat have left BTC?” That sum refers to the $250 bill, as well as similar sum that BTC tried to charge for his wife’s cell phone despite the number having been switched to Aliv already.

BTC yesterday said all Mr Raine’s issues have been resolved.