I cannot express how dissatisfied I am with Vodafone's services to date. I live in the middle of Canberra (Curtin, ACT) and 9 out of 10 calls I make will drop out due to No Service. Quite often my phone will also display No Service and I am unable to even make a call. This is totally unacceptable!!!

To add to my frustration, I tried to activate Direct Debit using myVodafone online, however the system crashed (on 3 separate attempts!) and told me that I should call Customer Service on 1555. After doing this, and finally getting through, the operator told me he could not take my details and I should use the online system. I tried to explain to him that is why I was calling and as he was getting his supervisor to assist when my call dropped out ... AGAIN!!!!

I am only in my second month of a 24 mth contract, but I can tell you now I am going to be doing everything I can to get out of this. I simply REFUSE to pay for a mobile plan that I can't even make calls on!

I was calling to get information and help on changing my plan. The website did not answer my questions. How is it that whenever I ring, the robot's voice is infuriating, it says that it will connect me to an operator, then doesn't, says you need to answer a few questions first, or even enter your mobile number to continue, continues to ask me questions, talking to this machine for 10 minutes just to get an operator when it finally cannot help me any further, then i'm on hold for 43 minutes. It transfers me to the wrong department, and i'm on hold for another 13 minutes before my call is answered. It cannot help me, most services will at least let you connect to a real person if you say 'operator' enough times, but vodafail is so incredibly infuriating, i'd rather be on hold than talking to Lara anyday. Vodafail has epic fail customer service.

dear Vodafone. "you have no technical problem, we will upgrade coverage in your area in 12-18 months" is not acceptable. I had acceptable coverage 4 months ago, what went your. I am not paying $79 for your awful customer service and your awful coverage.

Am having the usual problems as everyone else; i.e. poor reception, coverage, call drop outs, difficulty is communicating with customer service and technical difficulty departments (was actually told today that the cause of my problem was due to the recent floods throughout Queensland, although he couldn't explain why I had this problem for the last 6 months), then wanted me to provide a list of all the addresses I have been at where I have experienced this problem....???????? What the...?

I have been with Voda Fone for many years, I have had my I phone 3 for over a year and the signal and 3 G network appeared reasonable up till December 2010. I use to always have at least 4 or 5 signal bars displayed constantly. From all of December till this date it's appeared to be getting even worse if that possible. No signal whasoever tonight i n my area of Putney Gladesville. Ring customer service previously and it took a conservative 1 hour to be told they were not taking calls that evening. Prior to that i have waited to be told by lara I have progressed in the Q , as my I phone was about to run out of battery. Didmn't have to worry thou, I got gonnected to An Indian male, that I could not understand, and he could not understand me. I would assume the problem may have been that he could not even comprehend, interperate, nor complete even the most rudimentary customer service. I was polite at all times and respectful of the apparently non speaking male. I asked if I could perhaps speak to a supervisor or someone eles and \I'm sure he hung up on me, I had the 1 signal bar going. Voda Frustration, I guess they work on the principal, if you make the problems so converluted, protracted, exasperating, or in this case take hours upon hour of what would have been productive moneyu earning time for me , with them leading me on to believing my call will be answered in soon, with false hope. To be then being looked after by a person that can not even use the Universal language English. Then when I asked to put through to a supervisor to get hung up on, how infuriated I became leaves an idelible imprint of fool me once same on you, if I stay with Voda FoneShame on me! I feel like that Guy the 70's movie Network, Peter FINCH. Sticking my head out a window and Yelling out,"I'm as mad as hell and I'm just not gonna take it any more!" I hope you don't scub this, as Voda Fone appears to dismiss their loyal customers.Cause they are just the plain facts as I see them as a proponent of the Aussie fare go. I feel, if they disenfrachise, remove or complicate the complaint and feed back procedure they have less reports, hence less problems to deal with. A problem not taken to them, appears to be a problem solved for them!

i thought it was only Ghana here that we are experiencing poor service from Vodafone but rather a global issue. i pay high bills and don't get the quality service. as at now i can't check my billing online neither can i check my vodafone webmail. i made a report on several occasions but nothing seems to be done. am fedup with them waiting for better internet service providers to come and save Ghanaians. every body is complaining. God save us.

Can't login to MyVodafone. No method available to check how much data I've used or how much credit I have left on the plan. Cannot contact vodafone customer service. Terrible coverage. Facebook is extremely slow: that's when it loads.

Vodafone are costing me a lot of time and effort to get nothing done. I simply want to change my business account to a personal one and stay with them. You know, keep paying them money for service!! They are making it hard both in the aussie shops and overseas call centre. What if all Vodafail customers started charging reverse charges for the time it takes to deal with and fix their customer service problems. I think I will start running a reverse bill log at $60ph for the time it takes for me to deal with their issues. Something that the Govt. might consider for future Telecommunications standard contracts. Maybe then they will change.

my phone has been dropping out for months! I have called vodafone and spoken the the "fantastic" Laura 4 times today and guess what, every time i was put on hold my phone cut out!
My girlfriend is with optus, she called last friday because she doesn't have great reception at home (zetland sydney NSW) she spoke to a real person and they let her straight out of her contract with 19 months to go because they recognise that that area is a bit of a black spot for them... Congratulations Optus - great customer service and HONEST!
Im so over the headache this is causing me and everybody else!

ok so i work for vodafone and my mobile is with vodafone so i feel your frustration, but i just want to put out the point that IT IS NOT STAFF'S FAULT, this is our job my store prides on customer service and thats why our customer enjoy coming back to us, but we are getting customer personal abusing us calling us very horrible names. so please just remember we are human. we are facing the same issue you are with our phone, so be poliet its not hard

There are many posts on this site relating to poor customer service experiences, in particular issues not being chased up by the call centre and/or calls not being returned as promised.

One way to allowing the resolution of outstanding customer service enquires to be tracked, followed up and eventually resolved would be as follows.

If a customer has an issue which cannot be satisfactorily resolved on the first call the overseas call centre must provide the customer with a reference number.

A customer should then be able to log in through 'My Vodafone' see the reference number, a precis of the issue and its current status in terms of resolution. Some other organsiations such as banks provide such a facility.

If after say for arguement 48 hours the overseas call centre has not called back and resolved the problem the customer should then be automatically entitled to ring a special Australian based call centre to enable the issue to be escalated. Calls to the Australian call centre could be filtered by requiring the customer to key in their reference number on the phone. Also NO 'Lara' involved in this call centre.

If due to the complexity of the issue the Australian call centre cannot resolve it first time the status and progress of resolution of the problem should be updated for the customer to see online through 'My Vodafone'. Certainly the Australian call centre should be taking ownership of resolving the problem and be hopefully staffed with people who actually use Vodafone and this understand it quirks.

If after a further period of time the issue is not resolved the customer can then follow other external options e.g. TIO.

Certainly there would be an incentive for Voda to keep costs down by expecting the overseas call centre to solve the problem first time. However, for the sake of serving and keeping customers through this difficult period it would certainly help if customers could fell that if their issues remained usnresolved for say 48 hours because the overseas call centre did not call them back they could have access to a local call centre with local expertise.

If long delays begin to occur in getting through to the Australain call centre (hopefully this does not happen) there is an option for the customer to email it with the requirement that the email is responded to in say 24 hours.

The above is a suggestion only, many understandably would say that access to an Australian call centre should be a first right. However, I think something needs to be done and that Voda should seriously consider something like this at this time.

I have just been on hold for over an hour to try to have my iphone 4 unlocked (as they've switched me from three to vodaphone due to service coverage issues). I complained about the 3 days that my phone has not had any service, and was put back on hold to customer service to have financial compensation, which I agreed to as long as I wasn't on hold for another hour. The call centre guy claims that my long wait on hold was "due to the floods in Qld" ??! great excuse!

This was meant to be a reply to #12888 Re: 18 Jan 2011 01:26:41am, but it is a major complaint on it's own as well. So I've posted it here. Note that Vodafone employees that work in store are just about the only Australian people we can complain to in order for them to pass the message to their Australian managers, who then pass the message to the company's Australian executives (depending on VHA's management hierarchy). It is then, we hope, that the Australian executives will help resolve the nationwide network problems by implementing checks and investing in an effective, undisruptive way to maintain the network towers. So VHA store employees, please use our initial feedback and give it to the manager, who will hopefully pass it on. Since we are still having problems, it seems that the company has organisational and management issues. VHA employees (ex or not), do not immediately complain against us about abuse, etc. You are hired to represent the company and have signed up knowing that you WILL (often or not) be dealing with angry customers and TOLERATE it, NOT personally but from the company's perspective; ie. AS A HUMAN RESOURCE ASSET OF THE COMPANY, I don't know how many times I have to emphasise this. Customer service, particularly in call centres dealing with customer issues, DOES actually require a good degree of tolerance with upset customers. Don't think you've signed up for the job thinking everyday will be sunny and sales. Think again. If you don't feel safe, then resign or join us on a battle against the company. Otherwise, you won't help us since there is little evidence of taking initiative to pass the feedback to the higher ups. Do something more constructive for once in your 'morning meetings' rather than just taking menial orders. But nothing happens, so both VHA employees and customers start this unending cycle of whinging and sulking. Thus, we keep coming back, more and more aggravated that nothing is resolved. 'It was the angry customer's fault, don't abuse us,' says the employee. 'It was Vodafone's fault, they aren't resolving my issue,' says the customer. Note that customers, in most cases, intend to point the blame and abuse to the company itself, but the employees mistaken it for themselves. Hopefully, this helps clarify the typical 'back and forth company vs employee vs customer argument' that follows a company's major issues. As for Nigel Dews' plainly obvious "IT'S ALL ABOUT KEEPING THE SHAREHOLDERS HAPPY" statement to VHA employees. WHAT THE FUCK. Is that all he cares about? His salary and making shareholders happy? We can tell by the ongoing fall of the company's reputation and the ill treatment of customer services, which means the ill treatment of VHA employees, something we all don't need but is inevitable at this point in time. Once again, the CEO needs to review the company's mission statements. Nuff said.

I can honestly say I've had a mountain of Problems with Vodafone both with my mobile and with Internet over the 3 year period I've had contracts with them. There has been more then 1 period where there has been no reception to either my phone, or my Internet or both.

In the 3 periods of time I was out of reception it lasted no less then 24-48hrs. One period was recredited to my phone for the pay period but for the other two periods it was not covered. When I went down to the store to get some information staff refused to give answers and 1 day even shut up shop so they didn't have to answer questions.

When i started my Internet contract I was informed that Newcastle was getting 3G connections were beginning within 3 months of my connecting and that my connections would be better which was why I decided to join up with them. At no point in 2 years did I get a 3G connection it may have stated it was on one but it never went above 2 bars of connection, it never became faster. Any gust of wind I'd be disconnected and this could mean reconnecting every 5 minutes even on a day with good weather. When I attempted to end the contract upon its completion I was told the contract was closed and I had already paid it off so had no bills to pay. Upon leaving the country my parents rang to tell me they had 2 bills from Vodafone to pay for my internet that had been stopped 2 months previous, they were entitled to no more money but they kept sending papers to my parents and they worried about me getting a bad credit rating so just paid the bills even though it was an error and I had no unpaid bills.

With my phones I've had through vodafone I've had a few problems. With my first phone contracted from September 2007-2009 my Nokia N95 had problems from the moment I bought it. I had bought that specific phone for its GPS capabilities which never worked. I went into more then Vodafone shop multiple times to tell them that this component did not work, I was told by vodafone employees there was nothing wrong with my phone it was simply that I was impatient and not holding the phone near the satelites. When the phone was 11 months old it turned off at work one day and could not be returned on, again I went into a Vodafone shop and told a store employee of my problems and was told it was probably cause i had a flat battery, the phone was sent away to be checked. It was a software problem and amazingly the GPS component worked immediately when they'd fixed the other problems, the store still denied it was a fault in my phone when it was new.

Although I'd had problems with that phone the new phone I'd wanted was only available through Vodafone. When I signed up I arranged for insurance on the contract, about 12 months ago I received a letter from Vodafone telling me if I did not respond to them by increasing the amount of money I paid for my insurance then my insurance would cease. I opted not to increase the money I was paying as it was already a hefty bill each month. Amazingly I am still being charged $12.99 a month for insurance for a phone even though they no longer provide insurance for as stated in their letter.

As I have moved to the UK on a working holiday I went back to a vodafone store to cancel my phone contract as I was told on signing the contract that if you close a contract early you owe 50% of the remaining contract per month of each bill. When I went in to end the contract I was told this was not the case and changed their rules and said I owed 100% of the remaining bill. Since I am paying off a very expensive phone bill for a contract not in use it gets frustrating that the website is down regularly as this is the only way that I can pay off my bill and when they decide to have problems with it I end up getting a late bill through no fault of my own.

As soon as this contract has ended and when I come home I will not be signing up again. I now have a second phone that has died so am paying $112.99 a month for a contract not in use a phone that died and no insurance even though I have to keep paying for it cause it was in my original bill.

i am constantly having to call vodafone relating to billing issues of being overcharged and paying for a non existent broadband service. i have raised these issues on a constant basis yet i still have not received word from a tech support person as i was promised. that was three weeks ago and counting. I am currently on hold trying to speak to a representative and i think it is going to longer than the three weeks i have been waiting for the callback. just putting it out there, i have been on hold for 3 hours and 40 min. this truly is a joke and the government is to blame for how corporations treat the general public. coming from Canada people have a fair say in how they are treated by corporations who just don't give a damn, but in all honesty this is my opinion Aussies are just to lazy to get off their laurels and complain. they piss and moan, yet they do nothing about it. if it wasn't for your site the majority of these people wouldn't do a darn thing. don't mean to offend anyone. the truth must be told and that is the reason the reason for poor customer service across the board with a wide variety of services through out private and government. "why complain, she'll be 'right" attitude, allow corporations to have their with you as does the government, but that is a different story.

Have been on hold for 32mins and still waiting to speak to a real person...

And worthwhile mentioning the fact that the first call I made to 1555 dropped out!
Was previously told my billing cycle ended on the 14th and they still cannot tell me the details of what I am liable for, for the past month.
Firstly I was told I would need to wait until the 15th to find out my bill amount, rang yesterday after waiting 42 minutes was told they can't see the bill until the 17th. Correct me if I'm wrong, but today is the 17th.
Ashish told me he would call me back and run through the details of each call. STILL WAITING for that call!
Ridiculous customer service...can anyone recommend a decent iphone 4 service in Sydney??
Optus looks good to me...whoever recommended to the ACCC that the merger with 3 and Voda would increase competition in the Telco industry were sadly mistaken. Nigel, was that you???

I feel like I have spent half my life on the phone waiting for some customer service...It's now been 44 mins of waiting to speak to someone. What a waste of my time, esp given I have been calling daily given that fact that Voda do not honour their promises to return phonecalls!

Hi there, I have had a number of problems with vodafone including the reception drop outs, text messages/picture messages taking upto 7 days to come through, I have had vodafone activate call barring on my phone eventhough I had paid my bill in full & when I called them up & spoke to them I was told it would take up to 4 hours to remove the barr & when I explained that was not good enough that I had 2 young children I was told but the customer service representative that if I didnt like it to get a home phone. I have had them overcharge my bills & argue with me over the fact that I was being overcharged. I have times where my phone tells me I have full reception but I cannot make calls/get calls or send or recieve text messages & a new recent thing now is my phone is calling people just randomly by itself even when I am sleeping & I am getting charged for these calls.

broadband service is hopeless in chadstone vic over two hours on saturdaday 15.1.00 dropped out 5 times . but this happens all the time we log on , always drops out ,have never had fast broadbanb speeds mainly bps somtines kbps always drops back to dial-up service then dropps out if you are on more than 25 minutes without dropping out extremely lucky
you send an complaint over the internet
all we have received is an computer generated response
no human has ever looked at our complaints
always received a standard genric response
vodafone refuse to accept any responsiblity for their poor service

The phone is still unable to make call or receive call since yesterday night. Anyone having the same issue? I called the Customer service line (the 1300 number from landline) but once i get into technical issue option, the voice machine just told me to call it back later as they are busy. No option to press a call back button. So where do I find the call back button? Oh my god, this is killing me.

For many years I was very happy with the vodafone service so much so that I talked friends into leaving other telecommunication companies that they were unhappy with. THIS I WILL NEVER DO AGAIN!! I am very disappointed that for the past six months there has been many problems with the service, such as;
* Calls dropping out
* 'Emergency Calls Only' more and more often being displayed
* Messages sent and receiver not receiving for days, if at all
* Sent text once and recipient receiving it three times!!
* Unable to use free vodafone to vodafone calls on xmas day
* Due to poor service battery life shortens trying every so hard to find
a signal!!
So Vodafone I shall never recommend your company again and very shortly will no longer be a customer.

It has taken two weeks but finally managed to beat call drop outs and lack of call backs from "customer service reps" and have put through a request for a network investigation. Now a week long wait to see whether the contract can be scrapped and I can put the frustration behind me. I have my fingers crossed!!!

We are having numerous problems.
1) Receiving sms messages days late sometimes don't get them at all, also mms messages have not been received at all.
2) Phone will constantly cut out during a phone call. Also when dialling a number it will connect then instantly disconnect.
3) 10 minutes into a phone call it will disconnect,when we call them back it will do it again at 10 mins.
4) One minute wew will have reception and then the next we will have nothing even at home where we should have reception.
5) When we contact customer service we are put on hold for more than an hour, or if we get them to call us back they don't at all we end up trying to call them back.

We have been a loyal vodafone customer for years and have never had a problem until now and we have not had the response we should be getting. They are not being loyal to us at all.

im am sick of having service drop out during important calls. it is really difficult to run a small business or just to have a life when i cant recieve or make calls reliably. lift your game vodafone.

Vodafone's reception failure and problems has caused me to make many calls to call back work colleagues, thus increasing my telephone usage bills. The 'coverage' is in Potts Point. My colleagues use telstra and optus, and they say that using vodafone is a mistake. I just want to leave vodafone without penalty.

My second problem was using the vodafone help numbers to establish a new vodafone internet account, ie, the dial-up broadband. I used the 'help' numbers on my mobile 'phone and was charged hundreds of dallars on top of my usual bill. They reduced by bill by $100, but it was still $180.00 more than I usually paid.

Poor customer service, issues with internet, unable to email etc.
Q. Will I be charged a cancellation fee if I break my contract?
After 1 hour and 22 mins - the cancellation dept was close!!!

I have been sending txt messages to 1512 to check my balance details (as advised by the 'lovely Lara'. I was advised by Vodafone CS that this amount was incorrect.

My billing cycle is starts on the 15th of the month, so when I checked my balance from 1512 I was very surprised to learn that I had $0 credit and an exclusion amount of $165. My phone was off for most of the day so I could check Voda's accuracy! Obviously NIL...

Has anyone else been experiencing this problem??

The customer service is ridiculous, I have had Voda CS saying they will call me back and they don't...

What a joke and I am really sick of it

Poor coverage, drop outs, incorrect billing, delayed text messages that are sent and received, absolutely shocking customer service if you can term it service. It caused me an argument with my ex boyfriend, he claimed he was ringing me, I didn't get any missed calls, he said he was sending me messages that I did not receive, we argued over whose phone was at fault. But it had nothing to do with our phones, it was the dysfunctional network!!

After they finally got me off my contract I decided to go prepaid I must have rocks in my head, Went to the vodafone shop waiting in Line to get a pre paid sim the guy said wont be long while another sales rep just looking probably on face book staring at me, the guy walks off serving another customer that just walked in then asked me if I was ok the lady that walked in said that guy was before me the other sales rep kept looking on face book and then the other guy walked strait out the back I thought wow cool and walked strait out good customer service there wankers,ended up getting it from coles they were more helpful, Went online to try to activate the Sim, Doesn't work tried 5 times now on hold for 40mins and still counting as I am writing this I must have nothing in my head far out only got myself to blame on this one should of learnt the fist time least they changed there hold music to Spanish or something vodafone wake up to yourself I should really same the same for myself too still waiting

been with voda 2 years and they offered an upgrade, silly me agreed. got my new phone in mail, havent used, havent activated new sim.. changed mind due to lack of reception, poor service and long hold times.. called to canx literally when received phone (on hold for 40 mins) as assumed there was a cooling off period.. went through one dep where i explained i wanted to canx and send back phone main reason being no reception was told "well why didnt you call the network department" she then trans me through to "cancellations" where i was again on hold for about 30 mins, the rep then asked everything i had jus explained.. then said canx fee would be $1657 as there was no cooling off period

My billing cycle os from 15th to 14 th and upto now it shows i have $7.68& 255 mbps outstading as of 4.30 pm today and the bill shows I owe them $1.65
How on earth this is possible. I have problems with getting sms and people calling my no coming as a voice mail. Really have got no clue wht to do with it. Every time I call the customer service minimum waiting time is 45 mins and most of the time they r simply clueless.

People have to realise that all netwoks have this problem at different times as I have been with pretty much every one of them. Within the last year or 2 the Telstra service was down for over 48 hours which no one seems to remember and it has been a long standing agreement within consumers that telstras deplorable customer service takes the cake.

It's all well and good to complain to these telco giants but all consumers must bear in mind the cost of VF hiring more staff to handle this, the cost of law suits and the cost of all this bad PR will only be handed back to consumers. You can be sure that if the outcome
of all this is that VF/3 mobile goes under that it's 2 main competitors: telstra and optus will increase their prices dramatically.. Simple business 101 people..

Can anyone tell me how to activate the call back option when you ring customer service? I don't want to spend the next hour of my life on hold!

I average 11 out of 15 calls I make dropout. The most frustrating of them was after spending 57 mins on hold to the Australian Tax Office that as soon as the customer service rep says her name the line drops out! I call back only to be on hold for another 83 mins...

5.5 hours total time on hold to speak to vodafone customer service in 1 week plus call dropped out twice during this time. Have to stand in corner of back garden just to get 1 bar of signal! Absolute crap service, coverage and communication. Have decided to give optus a go!

with my blackberry. Calls drop out constantly, data dropping in and out on a daily basis. everytime i call customer service (mind you takes forever to get through to a person, and they happen to be overseas and dont know what i am talking about) all they say is what area are you in? and check 'apparently' check the signal in that area. no matter how many times i say it happens all over sydney not just one specific area. then i happen to be left on hold for 15 mins, no one wants to speak to me??
same spot same time use my work phone which is optus and is crystal clear, doesnt drop out full reception.
texts delayed, blackberry messenger DELAYED. internet not reliable AT ALL. whats the point of having internet on your phone if you cannot use it??
ALSO. calling other vodafone users and saying their number is switched off,(even though when tested right next to me and apparently HAS some bars of reception) THEN TO MAKE MATTERS WORSE - trying to call voicemail and cannot get through or hear the the message clear enough... What if it were an emergency? ive had enough of Vodafone and would like to change. How did you change to another provider?

For the past 2 months, I have experienced countless issues with Vodafone and their VERY POOR customer service!
I have been waiting to receive my IPhone 4 upgrade for over a month now and am STILL yet to receive it. I received a phone call from Vodafone on 5/1/2011, stating that my phone and my siblings phone (who by the way, ordered her upgrade 2 weeks after me), would be delivered on 13/1/2011. I therefore, had someone stay home for the day to receive the handsets. Instead, ONLY my siblings phone was delivered.
When I called Vodafone to discuss this issue further the lady suggested that it was due to the QLD floods. She then went on to state that my sibling would have received her phone prior to mine as she ordered it in January 2011, whilst I ordered mine in December 2010! WHAT THE??? When I asked to speak with her supervisor, she HUNG UP ON ME!!!

I then had to make another 2 phone calls to vodafone (over 1.5hrs waiting time), and have been told something different by each customer service representative I have spoken with!

The customer service representatives could not care less about the issues that their customers are currently facing. Instead, they hung up on you, LIE and/or read out their 'apology and sorry for your inconvenience' blurb, and leave their customers to pick up the pieces!

Vodafone.......you should be ashamed of yourselves!

supposed to have excellent coverage in the area I live according to their map, can't use phone inside house and frequently drops out when finally able to make call. delayed messaging is a huge problem, need phone for work and to keep in contact with child. vodafone never replied to complaint email. told by local vodafone store it was my 'outdated' phone and sim card, so purchased new one and had to go back to store 7 times to get set up properly. on prepaid, what entitlements do I have, don't want to pay to switch service providers

I naively signed onto a contract with vodafone about 20 months ago, and have regretted it ever since. I have had a few major issues with them regarding insurance, appalling coverage when i live so close to the CBD of the 3rd largest city in Australia, and the fact that their customer service is a joke. like, not just bad, it is actually useless.
within the past 12 months I started a new job working at a major phone dealership, that deals with Vodafone, telstra, Optus and 3. I will not name the company or location, but one of the requirements is that we don't put down other carriers if there is no need. if we do a coverage checker and it looks good, and the plan suits the customer, we do it, and can't advise against it. but in recent months i have been steering customers well clear of vodafone and 3. i just explain my own experience as a vodafone customer, and then show my own phone's current signal compared to a store phone on telstra, and we both have a laugh at how bad it is.
after having no service for almost 2 days now during the floods, a time when we also had no electricity meaning no modem for the internet (NOT vodafone thank god), i was unable to contact friends and family, get help, nothing. vodafone, that is just not good enough. I am now on a one person mission to sway customers away from a useless network. YOUR TURN, VODAFONE!!!

This is my Vodafone story...

I received a call from Vodafone('s computer) 2 days ago saying that 2 months of bills were overdue and they would cut me off next week if i didn't pay them. Fair enough. So i logged in to my email to see my bills, but they had not sent either of them to me. They did however send me an email that said my bills were overdue. In this email there was a link to view my bills. I clicked on the link but, of course, that just lead to an error saying they were unable to open that bill.

So, I tried logging into my MyVodafone account online. Not ever really using this before I did not know my password so I answered the secret question instead, which was my father middle name. They told me the answer to the question was wrong 3 times before they locked me out for 24hours. I know my fathers middle name.

I decided to try and call them instead, but found that even though they had told me only a few hours earlier that my service would not be cut until at least next week, they had cut my service.

I walked into a Vodafone store yesterday and asked the sales rep to bring up my bills for me. After looking at the overdue bills, I decided it was fair enough to just pay the money.

On my way home from work (before I was able to pay the bills) my phone was reconnected and a million messages came through, one from Vodafone. The message told me that for the current month (not the overdue ones) I owed almost $100 over my cap for services that the cap does not cover. I am 100% sure that I did not use any such services.

I went home and called them again from my recently usable mobile phone. After dialing 3 times to 3 different Vodafone customer service numbers which all quite literally hung up on me every time I tried to get through to a customer service representative, I was finally put on hold the forth time.

After over an hour on hold, someone finally answered. To compensate for their shitty service, he is (apparently) giving me $20 off my next phone bill - which may I add, does still not even nearly equal the amount of money they are trying to overcharge me for for my current bill.

He put me through to the billing service to assist me with my issues and told me there will be a 7-10 minute wait on hold. 2 hours later, some one finally picked up. He said that Vodafone cant even view my bills and that they have to investigate which will take up to 5 business days, however they assured me that my service would not be cut before that time and he would personally call me on the 21st of January.

Today my service was cut again...

We have terrible signal at home. The only place we can get a signal is at the end of the driveway. Fat load of good that does if its raining. In the House or in the back yard, virtually nothing. Definately not good enough to call with. This doesnt happen with other carriers. Other problem is I had to go over seas for work, asked what the call rates were, then when the bill came at the end of the month the rate was almost double what i had been told. called Vodafone "customer service" and said that thats what rates were and had to pay the bill. They also called my wife 10 days into my trip (i was uncontactable for big parts of the trip)and said the system had picked up on an unusually large increase in spending on the account and had to pay at least half or they would cut the service. I had rung them though before i left to inform them of the international usage. i have been with Vodafone for a bit over ten years and its the only company i can think of that as technology gets better, the product and service gets worse

Poor coverage, poor reception, lack on english when speaking to customer service rep.
On hold for upto 60 minutes WITHOUT FAIL.

Dropped calls, clients that I continualy have to call back as my phone disconnects all the time. Costing us more money each time I have to call back. Cant get onto anyone at customer service. No service at all. Its a discrace.

The data services hardly work, the phone cuts out in between a call and the customer service is horrible and extremely rude.

I went to get a mobile broadband plan with Vodafone in November last year. Service was alright until I had 1 bar 3G signal, incredibly crap speeds, & it has stayed that way since beginning of January 2011. So much for a network maintenance, which some foreign customer service guy claimed would not take longer than a week. Must be some lying generic response, just an Indian version of Lara. The towers seem to be unable to handle the amount of users they are constantly attracting and taking in using their misleading marketing. Vodafone emphasizes their 'good' coverage and 'speed', which is so abysmal that even a snail can travel faster than the data that reaches my usb modem. Im living in a suburb with 3G coverage, but the connection dropouts are just appalling. It happens every few minutes. There is no point in using GPRS mode, since it's even slower than the oldest person alive. These days I seem to be paying monthly fees for nothing. You get several GB of usage and you can't even use it. This is seriously epic fail. It all started with me reading Vodafone's ad clustered site for technical information regarding coverage, speed, & service. They claimed to cover metropolitan areas, which included the suburb I live in. They claimed a reasonable speed range that most other telcos quote and boasted about their service. Then I waited an hour at the store to be served, the dealers seem to rather enjoy chatting with one customer at a time very slowly until their shift is over. To me, it felt like days. Finally I got my plan set up. After sorting out the VMC software problems, the product worked (yes I know strange as it may seem, it actually worked for a few glorious weeks) until it struggled again. Here I am, poor signal for weeks, 0-20Kbps 3G, & almost non-existent service. Even if the network tower is not far away & there is nothing major blocking the signal. Heres where the pain begins that customers have endured. I called Vodafone technical support 35 times, 30 of them were Lara transfer problems leading to call cut offs. WTF is the point of Lara's telemaze if it leads to cut offs. It's like having to solve a f*d up maze only to reach a dead end. The other 5 times led to horrid patchy musical hold up times equivalent to a theatrical length film. Finally I got to a foreign guy who told me these lame responses, which I, a pc expert, would have already tried. He still insisted me to try his troubleshooting even though I told him 10 times I've already done it. Ranging from reinstalling the device & software to deleting browsing history. Lame. Still got crap speed & signal. I really need to 'troubleshoot' someone in the head. Then he rambles on about a network upgrade in my area. Another generic response in their agenda. AND they always say there is no deadline for these upgrades. I hope people don't have to wait a lifetime's journey to get full signal again. Knowing their call centres are foreign these days, I gave up because even maintaining a call with them (that is prone to dropouts) will take blood, sweat, & tears. Now we have 12000+ Australians lobbying for a lawsuit against Vodafone, for reasons similar to my woes. I wouldn't be very surprised. We also have a recent issue involving customer data security breaches over the web. All Vodafone does is tell us that everything is fine. IT IS NOT. Whirlpool forums is packed daily with unheard complaints of Vodafone's services. In fact the threads are so vast it could form a large encyclopedia or a Lord of The Rings novel. As for the Vodafone staff seeking sympathy, think again. You are the cratered face of the company, so you must deal with the aggressive amount of recent customer woes. It is us customers that have all the power in the end. We can choose, in the extreme case, to do a mass exodus rather than put up with Vodafone's recent incompetences. We suffering customers (which seems to be a majority of Vodafone's customers in Australia, looking at how many complaints have plagued across the net) could all leave Vodafone & go to Telstra, Optus, etc. That will leave Vodafone Australia dying out of business, which will mean the Vodafone staff will lose their jobs. But then heres another issue. When customers attempt to cancel their plan & account, the customer service person attempts to hold on to the already dissatified customer for dear life like a leech, offering lame discounts & bartering. We shouldn't have to pay the remaining cost of the plan if we get slow unusable 3G net for weeks on end. We shouldn't have to rely on TIO and other full blown agencies to get our word across. This Vodafail site clearly indicates the last straw for the telco. It's just ridiculous, seeing that 'Vodafone' is an international business. If Vodafone doesn't fix these customer & network services, then too bad for the future. There won't be much for the telco to fix once its over. Not to mention the irony of 'gain sharing', I can barely post this using my Vodafone mobile broadband.

I live in North Qld and have been Vodafone for the last two years. For the first year I was a prepaid customer and did not mind when I lost service here or there. Since I have been on contract and more recently a new contract with an Iphone to enable me to keep in contact with everyone easily and mostly live off my mobile I have had nothing but dramas, constant loss of service, terrible internet service. Yesterday afternoon I believe everyone in Qld lost service for the whole afternoon. Yet I am still required to pay my monthly contract fee for services I am not fully provided with each month. On top of that I ordered an Iphone late last year which after chasing Vodafone up about its whereabouts was told my order wasnt processed and I would have to wait a further 12 weeks on top of the original 4 weeks wait due to someone simply not doing their job. Even worse when trying to sort out this mess as I had a new contract rolled over but no Iphone when i phoned for assistance not only had I been cut off twice I was then put through to a call centre somewhere outside Australia. I could not understand the customer service representative and he was not fully understand what the issue was. I requested NUMEROUS times during our conversation to be transferred to a centre in Australia where someone could help me. He refused and after arguing with me I decided to hang up. This meant I spent more time and i mean hours telephoning Vodafone going through the initial steps when you first call each time waiting and hoping until I could finally get through to someone who could understand what the issue was and I could also understand clearly. Although this matter was resolved I am no longer a happy customer of Vodafone and the constant service drop outs are simply ridiculous and we as customers are not getting the so called service we pay for. The only issue now is if I decide to switch telephone companies I would be up for huge cancellation fees which Im sure most of us cannot afford and I know I cant. It is very disappointing as when I lived in Europe Vodafone were great. It simply seems that Vodafone Australia just cant get it right.

I live in North Qld and have been Vodafone for the last two years. For the first year I was a prepaid customer and did not mind when I lost service here or there. Since I have been on contract and more recently a new contract with an Iphone to enable me to keep in contact with everyone easily and mostly live off my mobile I have had nothing but dramas, constant loss of service, terrible internet service. Yesterday afternoon I believe everyone in Qld lost service for the whole afternoon. Yet I am still required to pay my monthly contract fee for services I am not fully provided with each month. On top of that I ordered an Iphone late last year which after chasing Vodafone up about its whereabouts was told my order wasnt processed and I would have to wait a further 12 weeks on top of the original 4 weeks wait due to someone simply not doing their job. Even worse when trying to sort out this mess as I had a new contract rolled over but no Iphone when i phoned for assistance not only had I been cut off twice I was then put through to a call centre somewhere outside Australia. I could not understand the customer service representative and he was not fully understand what the issue was. I requested NUMEROUS times during our conversation to be transferred to a centre in Australia where someone could help me. He refused and after arguing with me I decided to hang up. This meant I spent more time and i mean hours telephoning Vodafone going through the initial steps when you first call each time waiting and hoping until I could finally get through to someone who could understand what the issue was and I could also understand clearly. Although this matter was resolved I am no longer a happy customer of Vodafone and the constant service drop outs are simply ridiculous and we as customers are not getting the so called service we pay for. The only issue now is if I decide to switch telephone companies I would be up for huge cancellation fees which Im sure most of us cannot afford and I know I cant. It is very disappointing as when I lived in Europe Vodafone were great. It simply seems that Vodafone Australia just cant get it right.

I have been a Vodafone customer for over 10 years now and have a complaint about their customer service. I now no longer call them for reasons that I am sure you are all aware of.

The reason I have posted here however is to advise that they went through a period of calling me to 'see how things are going'....So I took these opportunities (about 2 over 2 years) to actually tell them. After I told them of my experiences it would be taken as a personal attack and I would then have to explain that this is not personal but I am simply responding to her request for feedback. To me, it seemed that Vodafone were not training their employees to deal with such complaints. I don't blame the call centre staff as I think that is a had job....but it's a job nonetheless and should be undertaken in a professional manner.

Receiving text messages days later, no service, phone dropping out. I have rung customer service three times trying to get my contract cancelled. Each time I have been on the phone for over 1 1/2 hours and most of the time on hold. The customer service people are rude and don't listen. They are saying its my handset and has nothing to do with the coverage. They never return calls when they say they will. This has happened on two occasions.

I signed up with vodafone over 2 years ago. I was told my contract included $1000 worth of calls a month only to be hit by bills of 200+ saying that I exceeded the $900 included in my plan. I was never told about the tax I would have to pay on every bill. When I called up about my issue I was told that it was my fault for not double checking before i signed up and staff would never say $1000 worth of included calls even though that's what I was told. After many calls, call centers hanging up I thought what's the point. Then vodafone released the "check your remaining balance by text" this originally never mentioned tax again so I thought I could use the remaining value without exceeding my cap. I was mislead again. Again calling to complain lead to long holds that were over 2 hours in some cases, being transferred and hung up on. When I heard of a new $100 unlimited plan I thought they would let me swap over due to how I was mislead.. Only to be told I would have to pay over $1600 outright for breaking contract. Funny how they can lie but I'm stuck with them for two years. So I put up with the lack of customer service and faulty phone I had to replace myself (I could only afford a $27 phone from kmart) only to find that I had over a year until my contract expired.... Around Two months before my contract expired I was told by the people in my closest vodafone store I could upgrade. Not having what I thought was a reliable phone I had no other choice but to try and upgrade. I was told I had to call up to upgrade, so I did being placed on hold only to be promised contracts that either didn't exist or being hung up on and nobody could honor the promises made. I was on hold one of the weeks for easily over 5 hours. I gave up thinking that what's the point of upgrading if they treat me like shit. Again I had no other option as I thought my phone was the issue to my reception problems. I was told by another phone brand to call the ombudsmen about what was going on and I would find a result quickly. Funnily enough vodafone assigned a person to my case and they contacted me. The promises made to me about my new contract were kept and i verbally argreed to what I was told, however I asked for a fine print of my contract, and my insurance which still hasn't come. On top of that about a week after getting my new phone I had poor and no reception for 3 days making getting home a struggle as I couldn't transfer money on my phone. When I told my "specially appointed vodafone service operator" I was never given any reason for the reception issues and still today I struggle with many areas near my house and work with reception. Signing up again in the hopes of getting a good phone so I could have better reception was a waste, i had a $27 phone and now an iPhone and the reception issues are still the same.

I waited on hold for an hour and 10 mins before vodafail hanging up on me. I then ring back again wait for another 58 minutes, to finally get through to someone who spoke over the top of me, told me I was not listening and would not understand. Once I had finally got through to him to tell me exactly what was wrong, he said that yes they had been over billing me because my phone was not sending text messages properly so were sending more than once so I went over my cap....

So how is this MY fault?

Then i explain i am not receiving texts or phone calls - his response "yes well i have given you back that credit. - REALLY?! what about the calls and texts?

Not only was i on hold to wait for the "great" customer service but i also had to listen to them promoting their non-exsistant "great" plans and deals!

After receiving the worst customer service attempting to solve an unresolved data issue, Vodafone said they'd refund 2 months service, then billed me for it.

Customer service, I think not. Let's sue these suckers!

Ive had my N97 since Oct 2010 With Vodafail. Besides the fact that i beleive there is something wrong with the phone - and Nokia thinks it is user fault that the battery doesnt last, that the phone wont charge, that it drops out of charging randomly etc - My experience with Vodafone has been disasterous.

I struggle to get decent reception - and i live 15 kms from Sydney CBD. Many times my friends on Optus and Telstra have reception when i dont, my reception drops out randomly and i struggle to get it back - and im not even moving from my location and this happens,even the reception i have drops out in calls, I get delayed text msgs, or msgs i send are not recieved by the recipient untill the next day or longer, I supposedly have 3G reception but it fails to deliver.

The vodafone customer service is so atrocious that i refuse to even call the customer service line - because i know im going to sit on there for 30 mins or more, and then be told there is nothing they can do, and to take the phone into the store. The store people palm you off to customer service!! Its rediculous really. They keep passing the buck for blame. I have been unable to use my N97 and have had to buy a cheap make do phone so i could still use a phone. It runs out of battery within only a few hours, refuses to make calls, struggles to charge (and is only a bit better about charging if i take the sim out of the phone), reception drops out, the phone doesnt cope with the amount of memory it has, is slow.

Also Vodafone years ago used ot ask you if you wanted to change your contract to the new version of hte one you are paying that has better stuff with it - ie more money in the cap etc - but i havent heard a thing, i didnt even know i could transfer accross to the equiv contract. And again, you have to call the shitty customer service cos teh people in shops only want to sell the phone to you, they dont want to talk to you about any issues you are having.

I had to ring vodafone customer support about three weeks ago. I had an issue with recharching my pre paid account. When I attempted to recharge over the phone, the lara lady told me sorry, we have some technical issues.
So I had to ring customer support. 40 minutes later I FINALLY got to talk to a rude vodafone guy. I asked why I was experiancing this problem and WHAT WAS THE TECHNICAL issue? He said he doesnt know. I was left feeling angry and fustrated by the poor quality of customer service.

Upgraded two handsets to smart phones, supposedly changed plans to Infinite plans on same day (8 Dec). On 23 Dec phones stop working - unable to even call Vodafone! Call Vodafone on landline to be told we have a $1700+ bill and that is why we have been cut off (even though the bill hadn't been issued yet and therefore wasn't due!). Phone service reinstated by attending orginal Vodafone store where we upgraded handsets. Another hour passes in the store while we wait for the store manager to get through on the 'priority' line for Vodafone resellers. Vodafone never put us on Infinite plans so we were placed on deafult (and extremely expensive!) plans. Assured by Vodafone store that all was resolved. Rang in early January to confirm plans were correct and new bill would be issued. No! Plans still not correct! Customer service then ask me to attend store again to rectify. After explaining that there was no way I was wasting my time to rectify an internal Vodafone problem, the customer service person contacted the store (only because I had retained a piece of paper with the store manager's mobile number!). Vodafone then advised that store manager would rectify the problem within 36-48 hours and new bill would be issued. Tonight I have received text asking me to contact them to urgently discuss last month's account...WTF!!!

I am almoast ashamed to admit I have put up with this comapny since 1995, having said that they changed their data base about 8-10 years ago and have me registered from then only, however i have bills that will date back under my old comapny. I have notice a sharp decline in their services over the past 30 months approx where I now encounter poor service, offshore at that, no apologies, no recognition of length of loyalty to the carrier, poor service in local suburbs, dandenong road between Glenferrie and Orrong, Monash freeway Endevour hills section and again Pakenham Bipass, I travel these roads twice a day 5 days a week, as do tens of thousands of others comuters. The latest gaff if from my home where service shuts off for up to 2 hours at time. The phone aquired visa vodaphone arrived to my desk, 3 times faulty and they would not let me change phone type, this was very aggitating as again my loyalty to this carrier and high cll plan meant very little. I know longer have any faith and upon completion of my plan will leave Vodaphone, possibly they are owned by one of the big 4 banks as they have similar behavior issues towards customer care. Kind regards consistently disgruntled.

I read with interest all the Vodafail issuesand I thought I would wait in the hope that they would work it out. What a poor choice.

Poor 3G internet performance, 3-6 hour delays in receiving some voicemails and SMS.

Its just not good eneough.

Vodafail should be stopped from adding new accounts until they fix the issue

no probs signing a contract ...
god help u trying to cancel it.
was on hold for an hour and a half in which time i had a shower, blow dried my hair and heard lara tellin me the wait coz it won't be too much longer.
finally got thru to a rep who i requested compensation from for calling a 1300 # from an Optus number on top of wanting to cancel my contract.
he advised me he would transfer me to the right department - a department which informed me via an automated msg tht it was closed over the christmas and new years holidays.
went to a store after that and was informed by a rep that you can only cancel via customer service.
spent another hour on hold in store.
gave up and told the rep i had enough i couldnt wait any longer.
the rep actually OFFERED to do it for me .. i was hesitant but i thought hey he's offered .. all i asked was for a callback if he couldnt ...
2 weeks later and nothing.
this is the worst experience!!! dont understand how a compant can get away with this!!!!

I'm in Townsville in northern QLD and I and a mass of people have no signal right now this is pathetic, just yesterday i had my calls dropping out and people not able to get through to me it would go straight to message bank.
About a month ago i had the same issue and went and spoke to a vodafail consultant in their store and he was so disinterested and clearly didn't know what he was talking about and was rude to boot. I will be getting out of my contract for terrible customer service and S#!t reception, i would call them to complain but i have no reception .... -_-

I had two services with Vodafone. One private, and the other paid for by my employer.

Whilst on holidays, I had misplaced my private phone and needed the calls diverted to my work number so I can receive calls from both services. Well lets just say there is about 5.5 hours of my life I am never going to get back.

* 1st call. Got through to someone in god knows where and explained what I wanted. Was told that it was done and would kick in within 10 minutes. Rang my private service as a test 3 hours later, and went to voicemail.
* Tried again several times over two days, and still no good.
* Rang Vodafone Customer Service and was on hold for 1 hour and 20 minutes. Noone answered. When I finally thought I was going to get through, got a voice prompt from the ever so "charming" Lara, that there was a problem and cannot continue. I was cut off
* Repeat previous point x4 times in two days
* Went to Vodafone shop in Sydney, and explained what I was after and what I had done so far. They rang the same number I did, and I was left standing there for over an hour. Gave up an hour later
* Became incredibly frustrated, gave up and ported service to another provider.

You suck Vodafone. Completely over your complete lack of service and competence (both in your people and your technology). Some other provider is now getting my money.

A longtime Vodafone customer, I ordered a brand-spanking new HTC Desire online contract. Lovely. I receive it in the mail and discover a new SIM. Um, okay, I didn't need a replacment, but okay. Then I hop online, and discover I've been assigned a new number for the new plan. My old number has NOT been cancelled. I'm effectively paying for two accounts now.

Customer service explains I must not have specified that I wanted the new contract assigned to my existing account when I ordered the phone. This is possible. I don't actually remember seeing an option to do this. I *do* remember looking, although I also remember getting extremely frustrated at the fact that Vodafone's braindead orderform refuses to accept the address I give it as valid after 5 attempts. I might have been a little less than attentive to all the options when I finally managed to put the order from through on the 6th attempt.

So I get called back the next day and Vodafone's happy enough to make it so that the new contract is tied to my old number. So far, so good.

I'm providing the information that the accounts person is asking for. Then I get told something to the effect of "please hold for 2 minutes while we organise things here". Part-way through being on hold, the call ends abruptly. A line dropout? Irritating, but not serious - or so I think. I try to call back. I can't. In fact I can't call anyone at all. I restart my phone in the vague hope it might help. I get the message "Limited Service: Emergency Calls only". Whatever they did to my account to try to fix it has made it impossible for me to use it at all.

Of course this would happen right when I have no access to any other phone. I'm at home now, and guess who's spent the past 4 years happily thinking how smart they were becausing they were saving $20 to $30 a month by not having a landline?

I must now wait for my partner to come home so I can call customer support on his phone. From my previous experience trying to sort this out, I know that the accounts department, the department they tell me I need to talk to, will be closed. So I'm stuck until at least tomorrow with no phone access.

The phone itself, by the way, is lovely. Which just makes it all the more frustrating that I am currently completely unable to use it any capacity at all.

For the last 2 days I have had prolonged periods of NO reception whatsoever, and it's right in the middle of two major events that I really needed to be in contact, the birth of a new family member, and the flooding!!!! Thanks for absolutely nothing Vodafail, I was already sick of your poor service and calls dropping out, this seals the deal that I WILL be going elsewhere as soon as my contract is up!!!!

Vodafone is the exclusive carrier for the BlackBerry Storm. The phone stopped operating within the first three months of my contract. I returned the phone to the place of purchase (Indooroopilly) and after 4 weeks received a new phone. Four months later, the phone stopped working, again. Returned the phone to the Indooroopilly shop. This time spoke to the manager, who was insulting. Said there were no loner phones in the shop, so I would have to wait. He promised to call. After two weeks, no call. I then went to the shop in person, discovered there were, indeed, loaner phones available. Turned in my dysfunctional Storm. Waited four weeks. No call. Two more weeks. No call. Went to the shop, discovered my phone had been repaired and was just sitting there, waiting. The manager stated, "Oh, I forgot to call you!" Over two months, no phone, and instead of an apology, an insulting manager who could care less about customers he insults. At the end of the contract, I will be leaving, unless I can terminate early without penalty due to lack of service.

Vodafone are the worst telecommunications company ever. It took me 21 times to try and call my partner to see how our son was but, the service would not connect. Also I haven't had service for 2 days now and when I do call customer service, after waiting 36 mins to speak to someone they don't resolve the issue but say try my sim card in another phone! Why should I have to put up with there lack of, welll everything???
So friken angry with them...

I have had dropped calls at home and no reception at all at work, even both areas are well within Vodafone's service area. Been like that for half a year. Called V and after a while, got to technical staff. "reset phone" was first advice. That didnt work. "Replace SIM card". That didnt work. Called back to cancel my service, after a almost 90 min wait I finally got through. As soon as I said I wanted to cancel my service. They hung up on me!!
Now that's good customer service for you!!

Txt messages don't get send, don't even try to phone customer services, 1 1/2 hour on hold at least every time, that is if you are lucky. They give you the wrong information and then you have to try and call them again. Such a waste of time. And please don't ever try to upgrade your phone, absolute nightmare!!

Trying to speak to customer service officer and have been waiting for 3 hours and still waiting....

Dropping calls and general poor reception and service. I can't believe that their frontline staff in their stores are not able to discuss complaints and that we "would be better calling Customer Service". They can sign us up pretty quick, but when it comes to something a little prickly, they handball to the inefficient call centre that is "Customer (dis)Service".

Also a little concerned over the privacy things. Not sure how to go about ensuring my details are safe. I know they have issued a 'guarantee' of our security and privacy, but I take this with a grain of salt. Piss poor performance!!

Changed from another provider to Vodaphone 22/12/10, the next day after phone was all charged realised we couldnt get coverage in out house or local area, went back to Vodaphone store and was advised to call Vodaphone, which i did, they explained that there is issues in our area and they would forward my issue/problem on and we would have a reply within 5 days, they also sent a text message staing that, i have tried to call them numerous times and been on hold in excess of 45 minutes at a time and then get cut off, went into another Vodaphone store 9/1/11 and explained my problem that i cant get through to anyone and that the mobile is for work and that we have 2 small children and that we need to always be contactable, the staff member emailed vodaphone infront of me and advised me i would have a reply within 48 hours, to date i have had no reply or contact with vodaphone and we are paying for a mobile that doesnt work, what more can i do to change back to our old provider, this is ridiculous, TERRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE, will be spreading the word to NEVER chnage to Vodaphone.

SHAME ON YOU VODAFONE!!! I am in Toowoomba and we are currently in crisis mode. My family has been worried sick as myself, partner and brother are all currently vodafone customers and have not been able to get in contact with ANYBODY via phone OR text all week in the middle of the flash flooding!! NOT GOOD ENOUGH!! Every other phone network seems to be fine. Too bad if we were stuck on a roof in the middle of all this flooding and were trying to call out for help and couldn't because of a friggen useless phone company!! Not only that, my partner and I want to swap over networks asap, but can't unless we completely change our phones/numbers as we have locked vodafone phones..we can't even unlock them until vodafone is back online (whenever THAT will be..website is even down and lady at All Phones told us not to even bother trying their customer service line...), and even then, vodafone with slap with an unlocking fee!! I can tell you right now, they are going to lose a LOT of customers in south-east qld this week.

great time for vodafail to blame the floods for the poor service.

on hold for over an hour trying to set up roaming, i receive text messages sometimes up to a week late, customer service are useless and have no idea what they are doing and always give incorrect advice, they always overcharge on bills and claim they have made the mistake in error... the list is endlesssss

Same story as everyone else. Customer service used to be good but that is a thing of the past. Had reception issues for years now and supposedly in an area of full coverage. Sent an email to complaints and they replied with a generic paragraph on network services and wrote off the complaint as solved. ***Beware global roaming*** as i recently went overseas and afterdiscussing the call charges etc many times I discovered that they don't explin the fine print, to the point where they gave me false information when i questioned teh call rates. Thankfully they reversed the charges after i made a complaint, but i hd to do all the follow which was a timely experience.

I keep having trouble with drop outs, trouble with contacting landlines..
Issues with reception are a part of poor quality reception leading to repeating myself constantly with sentences when having conversations.
Poor customer service, wait times, poor resolving issues, drop out issues relating to customer care, no follow up calls made after an event of a drop out from members of staff on over three occassions!!!
Issues with 123 directories, a memeber of staff was unable to provide in formation within a reasonable time frame, contacted the customer service after up a chunk of credit was chewed up after the event. Had to get a supervisor, who then only paid me half back my credit, how stingy!!!

Living in in suburbs in Melbourne I usually have only 2 bars reception on my phone - have to stand outside in the rain so my phone call doesn't cut out and usually only get "emergency" reception when in my house. This is just pathetic, why on earth did i leave telstra? I cannot send photos, but get chraged for it when i try and the customer service does my head in - do not yell at me "Bob" from India, you are supposed to help me :( After just going to Merimbula for a week - i had perfect reception and very fast wireless internet - perfect - why on EARTH would in the inner suburbs of Melbourne not have this and a cournty town does?!!? - here's hoping that the company gets the pants sued off them, they go under and we can all get out of our contracts asap. Signing off - Peeved of Melbourne

I'm on prepaid with vodafone after a nasty experience a few years ago whilst on a plan. Poor customer service and over billing, hidden fees and taxes etc. This was a few years ago and in Nov last year I needed a new phone, and fast as I cracked the screen on my old phone. Didnt have much cash so thought why not, I'll give them another go. Signed up in store (took over an hour mind you) and got a brand new Sony Ericsson X10 Experia! I wanted to keep the same # so I was given a new sim, which I was told would activate in a few hours and the old sim would cease working. To this day, i'm still using the prepaid sim. I went in store to inquire about it and was advised that I am still listed as a prepaid customer! YOU IDIOTS!!!! Me - 1 Vodafone - 0... THANKS VODAFONE YOU TWITS!!

droped calls, no network coverage, poor battery life on the HTC Desire HD, poor customer service

I am a new customer and they double billed me for my first month. I paid my bill manually after they assured me that there wasn't a auto payment set up on my account. After paying, they direct debited me and for the next three months claimed that I had only paid once. 8 Calls (and 8 different 'Customer Service' representatives) later, the issue was resolved without so much as a 'We're sorry'. At one point (3rd call) they even claimed that they couldn't transfer me to their manager and that they didn't have a complaint department. What a joke.

I rang on wed 5th of jan to try and get out of my contract and waited 1 hour to get through but after 5 mins the call drops out and they never rang me back. It was to late to call back i so rang them back the next day. didn't have to wait to long this time round, after 5 mins talking to customer service the guy told me if i wanted to get out of my contract and not pay the fee i had to try a sharing dock to boost my signal. Now why didnt they try that in the first place, i somehow think it wont work. Oh they still havent fixed up the prob that they charged me for 2 months of not using internet.

I've been a vodafone contract customer for about 5 years now. They offer great deals on new phones and really good contracts. There have definitely been some reception problems and I need to find out more about this breach of access to confidential customer information. The way I understand it VF has been allowing its contractors unlimitted access to all our customer records via an online portal. The details of this sound like a real worry. I'm yet to decide how upset about this I am and whether or not to join the class action. Having said that I must say I really like Vodafone, my experience with them has always exemplified superior customer service with any bill disputes being resolved quickly with either a refund or an offer to meet me half way. this generosity of spirit goes a long way. I can't help but worry that we will lose this if we throw them under the truck. My experiences as a Telstra and Optus were awful and I have to say I appreciate the best of a bad bunch.

I have very bad problems with Vodafone reception where I live in Tasmania, calls dropping out and other days having no service for up to 48 hours, I have no home phone and I rely on my mobile. My daughter has severe asthma we had to call an ambulance early one morning because she wasnt breathing and I had no reception. Im also not happy with the customer service, delayed text messages, delayed voice messages, also not showing missed calls and being unable to call out. Friends and family who have tried to call and all they get is voice mail, or its switched off when it isnt and it wasnt in use at the time, and its all when the phone is in good reception range. it is just joke. why should we be paying for something we cant even use!
Tania from Tas

Maybe the operators would be able to take your calls if everyone stopped complaining to the tio, tio complaints take operators away from their original roles in customer service...

Ive been trying to speak to anybody from customer care for the last three days, nobody picked up the line except that useless voice system called Lara!!!!
Vodafone is giving bad customer service a new meaning..

Am currrently on the phone trying to get through after being told to redial multiple times!

Have had issues with Vodafone for over 2 years. My blackberry curve was playing up, which took forever for them to acknowledged was faulty and I was getting charged ridiculous amounts for multiple messages being sent and vodafone's particularly laggy balance updater. I.e. It would tell me I had $200 of credit on my $49 cap plan when i had far less or it "couldn't provide a balance at this time". This would lead to my account going over, how can i manage my account if they can't tell me how much i got to spend? What? Spend less so they can have more of my money for less work? How many telco providers can't even provide you a normal account balance? I understand that it's not live, but be at least 1-2 days up to date.

Lara....oh Lara...How i wish you could actually understand a word i say. I've tried in futile to get Voda to fix issues, but this is just plain useless when you can't even get from point A to point B. I personally believe it is designed to just stall customers so they don't need to hire as many customer service operators on the other end in India.

Lastly, I for the love of god was reluctant to sign up, but have just signed up to Vodafone in December as my partner was also on the network (free calls voda to voda). First off, network signal has been shotty to say the least. I get calls that are patchy and I am on a new phone. My new blackberry torch 9800 (yes it's only just come out) sometimes losses reception and even rejects my sim. WTF? Yes Vodafone sucks and now i am stuck with them for another 24 months. Why can't you just work?

As i finish writing this...guess what? I'm stil waiting for a voda rep to answer my call...30 minutes in. Oh did i forget to mention that they are sending multiple bills for 2 different accounts? Which was what my call was regarding... And here comes the patchy reception from their own call center!

Voda I hope you get sued for every cent you've cost us loyal customers.

Issue 1: Poor customer service? Maybe not super poor, but less than ideal for sure.
Once my previous contract ended just midway through last year, I bought myself a handset from online (a Nexus One shipped from the States) and changed myself to a Sim-only cap which included 3G data allowance.
3G didn't work. The Vodafone dealer/reseller told me I needed a new sim (er... ok) so I go to the official brand store and wait in line forever (at least the chick who served me was polite enough) and I told them my problem and that I was told to get a new sim. No questions, suggestions, second opinions, just an "ah, ok" response and they gave me a new sim. Still no 3G. I thought my phone was faulty, but then I swapped sims with a friend with the same phone and that magically worked (although my sim f**ked his phone up momentarily). So I succumb to calling the call centre where the very helpful individual on the other end of the line informed me that data wasn't enabled on my account. They helped switch it on for me but they couldn't answer why it was disabled in the first place, despite my probing and cajoling. Although what I -really- enjoy is the fact that the staff in-store couldn't even take the initiative to solve the problem properly by checking my account options to see whether data was enabled in the first place.

Issue #2: Reception issues
I've had audio quality issues in the past (others not being able to hear me) and chalked it up to my handset (an original 1st gen iPhone). I changed my phone and plan, but since moving to my new place I've noticed a brand new set of reception issues. Nowadays, my phone calls often consist of the other person's voice cutting in and out such that I can't even follow what words they're saying, let alone piecing together a sentence, and eventually the call just drops out. The other person can hear everything I say, I just can't seem to hear them. In my unit this seems to happen 99.99% of the time. I play the walk-around-the-unit-repeating-"hello? hello? are you there?" game until I find a spot where I can start to hear them. It's not my handset, because it doesn't happen everywhere in the world/Sydney. It's not my unit, because everyone else who passes through my unit (including my housemates) are fine. I have to admit I was in denial at first, but now I'm pretty sure I'm a victim of sh*t poor service.
My family's mobile plans are all through the one Vodafone account which I manage. I can only hope that they aren't experiencing the same issues as I am because I loathe to think that our family is funding this freaking circus freak show that is Vodafone AU.

Issue #3: Security breach
Seriously. WTF. How stupid can you freaking be? Any and all breaches should be traceable because every single staff member should have a unique friggen login ID (amongst other authentication protocols). And high-turnover/low-level staffers should have the most limited access to personal information possible (if a mere dealer is responsible for such a serious breach, then it is most -definitely- the fault of Vodafone AU and its poor business/IT practices).
If there are indeed instances of "communal" login IDs in place at Vodafone branches/resellers/whatever, I don't see how changing the passwords every 24hrs is helping to track/isolate an offending employee/dealer who is using a login that is also used by n individuals (where n is > 1).

Issue #4: Lara
I hate automated phone menus which ask for verbal responses/cues. But my goodness, Lara is the ONLY one who makes me swear like a sailor within 20 seconds every freaking time I call. I feel very sorry for the individual behind Lara's voice. I just know that if I heard her on the street I'd instantly think of Lara and be like "F*ck f*ckity f*ck aarrrggghhhh!" and want to punch her in the face.

well it strats with getting no reception in my house secondly i complaind about it so i went to a vodafone store. I have an Iphone they told me to go to the apple store. so i did. Apple told me my phone is fine its a network issue. so i went back to vodafone and told them its a network issue. They couldnt give me and answer and told me to call their customer service. is was on hold for an hour an half. i just hung couldnt be stuffed waiting. i went away on holidays and my phone was stolen. i tried ringing vodafone to report my phone was stolen it took 13 etempts to contact them then when i finally got through after a 4 hour wait. i get a F@#&*% indian lady on the phone who cant understand me nor english.

I went into a store to get a new phone they cant help me i spend alot of money with vodafone i need my phone for my business. they told me there is nothing they can do. so im stuck in a situation i really want to get out of my contract and go to either optus or telstra.

Back on the 4th of September 2010 I upgraded my phone contract and as a result, became a vodafone customer.

The short version of the ever so long saga is...
I was told my iphone 4 would take 1 week to arrive, after 3 weeks still waiting, and several lenghty, on hold, phone calls I was told it was due to the large volume of customers. The phone then got delivered to the wrong address (somewhere in Sydney,I live in Melbourne) and signed for after now waiting over 4 weeks total.

This was when the real problems began. Vodafone started the new service on the new contract despite me informing them I didn't have the phone, I didn't even have a sim card for this new service...hence I was now not able to receive or make calls on my current phone. As I was heading overseas this was an issue, one they said they couldn't fix until I had posession of my iphone 4.

Instead of prioritising my case and sending me a new iphone, they tried to recover and resend the original one. This was such poor and inefficient service, too ridiculous to even justify. 2 more weeks went by and despite my attempts to with the customer service line, I kept getting different representatives who I had to go over every detail with again and again. My longest time on hold was 88minutes! Each time I was promised 2-3 more business days and my phone would arrive. 2 more weeks passed so we are up to 8 weeks waiting for my iphone 4 to be delivered and battling with a 1990 loan phone... I had had enough! I wanted the contract dissolved and wanted to be done with voadafone forever! When I demanded this be done I was put on hold for another 40 odd minutes before a new "supervisor" came onto the phone and told me I could go into a shop (4kms from where I live)and pick up a handset, pay for it and get them to connect it on the spot. Hooray was my intial reaction as in the coming two weeks I was sending 200 staff and students overseas to four different destinations and I was the emergency contact! I left the shop and was told by morning, my service would be connected.

Of course it wasn't and being a long weekend apparently there was nothing that could be done. MORE WAITING!! In the new week, again, several lengthy times spent on hold to the call centre occured and I was told that during the transfer of my number to the new service, there was a data error/computer glitch and my number got "stuck". I was told it would take 2 business days to sort out.

By now my job performance and reliability had been affected and the personal stress was totally absurd. It took 2 more weeks for them to "un-stick"/recover my number and finally on the 11th of Novemeber (10 weeks after signing up) and two crappy laon phones later, I had my phone in my hand and my serivce connected.

As the whole saga was just absolutely appauling, unprofessional etc I asked vodafone how they intended to compensate my for the trouble they had put me through. They offered me 3 months free, which I accepted. But of course I am now battling with them now as they are billing me, charging me for the iphone that I have already paid for and due to the incompetent notes on my file I am having to explain it all again. My last correspondance with them was through a vodafone store where the real life service agent and I spent 79 minutes on hold with them trying to get my billing issues sorted. Not even going into a shop gives you the right to quality customer service...what a joke of a company!

How anyone can operate a business like this is beyond me, I can't wait til my contract is done, I have told all of my friends to steer away from vodafone or any voafone carrier and I myself will never have anything to do with them again!

Lu (Melbourne)

Where to start? Ive been on my contract for approx 10months. Since the very beginning, Ive had lost txt messages, "call connection failure" drop outs, no reception etc. So the resolution? Call their customer service apparently because in store vodafone staff have NO CLUE what they are talking about and are useless.
So you call, and call, and call, and call, get an investigation that never gets completed, call back, call back, call back.
Then finally get through and leave your number for a call back. Nothing. So you call back call back and call back. THEN you get hung up on twice, disconnected 4 times and then you cant get through when you once again... call back!! So disgusted in the lack of professionalism. You would think that with all the media covergae of them lately theyd be more careful in how they treat their customers. DISGUSTING

I recently called customer service from the airport to double check my international roaming was on before going overseas.. the man who answered the phone could hardly speak any english but the words "call back in 24 hours me no english"..i couldnt believe what i was hearing.. i was calling vodafone customer service.

I hung up and called back again to get another man who could speak a little more english then the last guy.. he checked all and and said it was on..as I has expected it to be on..

Once arriving overseas I had no coverage at all.. thus not being able to have regular contact with my kids or for any emergencies..
On arrival back into Australia I went to the vodafone store and asked why this happened.. they check and said she global roaming is and has always been on, we can texplain why it didnt work best to call custmoer service...hmm

I called customer service and the lady said " i dont know why you should have called us when you were overseas from your phone" ??? yeah right..

Very very disappointing.

after having been given the run around by their so called customer service for over an hour, the last person i spoke to suggested that perhaps i should purchase a pre-paid sim from telstra or optus to use and have my calls diverted to that number until they can sort out my network issues!

seriously...this is pathetic!

Where to start.....the last 12 months I have been trying to get a proof of purchase from Customer Service and STILL to date have not received it. My phone is now not working and yet again can not get it fixed by insurance as i don't have a copy of the purchase. The last week I have been on the phone or should i say getting dropped out or experiencing problems with vodafone and still have not spoken to somebody. I have had a gut full....no working phone, paying a bill for what i don't know. I really hate vodafone!!! looking forward to my contract ending but am at the point where i feel i will just go to another provider and let them chase me for the bill...then keep the phone dropping out on them and tell them that I'm experiencing problems or better yet have them wait 2 hours on the phone to get some money. Not happy at all with the lack of help....customer service ha ha is a JOKE!!!

I have cancelled my contract with vodafone due to poor customer service. I lodged several complaints and not one was answered, nor acted on in any manner at all.

They have since advised me of a $496 bill which I will not be paying for cancelling my contract 6 months early.

Also, their insurance process is completely rubbish, and excess is extremely high.

I will never use Vodfail again!!!

I have been with Vodafone for over 4 years and in the past 6 months I have been disgusted with the level of customer service. Ques on hold of up to 1 hour and when I do finally speak to someone they can offer me no help, that is if they can speak English. The stores are not much better, advising I am the only one with these problems...any of these sound familiar:

No Coverage
Calls Drop Out repeatedly
Poor Battery Life, I have to charge my at least twice a day
Text and Voice Message delays, sometimes I don't even receive them

I am at a loss as to what to do, no one seems to be able to help me and I am locked into a contract for the next 18 months!

I had a handset fail under warranty. But it was my second handset after the first was replaced under insurance afte rit was stolen. But they couldn't find the paperwork confirming my new handset so they sent out the proof of purchase for the first handset (which was no longer under warranty). What insued was a game of tennis between their customer service centre and their call centre in which I was the ball.

To get the replacement I had to drive from far southside Brisbane to Milton 4 times and endured countless frustated hours with Lara trying to get through to someone to get to the bottom of the problem.

In the end I did not get any customer service and to get a result had to act as a mediator between their two departments just to settle what should have been a simple warranty claim.

No signal, however internet connection is working. Luckily I'm not in the affected flooding areas, this is poor servicee Vodafone!

From the How to Complain page it states for Vodafone Customer Service:

"When you call, you have the option of Vodafone calling you back when they get to your call."

Not today, there is just a message of there being a technical fault. How is it possible to complain when their internal systems are broken?