Me being me, I tried to help them…

Fri, Jun 23, 2006 at 11:59 PM
To: sortmeout@virginmobile.co.za

Greetings,

OK, I can see you are trying to make it simple….
BUT, I really can’t figure out what’s going on on page 2 (http://www.virginmobile.co.za/virgin-portal-customer/RefineYourPackage.do )?

I’ve got experience with contract details and all that jazz, but you guys have lost the track…

First you ask for a down payment value, then some minimum willing to spend monthly (you should really make this a dropdown of possible values, because I’m sure the logic behind triggers on discrete boundaries only anyway),
then there’s the confusing “Finance” block with a couple of choices (what is that now? Paying off the phone? Is it included in the R100pm quoted? Or is it over and above the R100 that has to be paid?)

Where’s the line between contract and prepaid? Or what’s your story? It isn’t clear. Try to make it more linear instead of putting blocks of information on one page that confuses the user (for the “create your package” section)

All I want to see is: How much is it going to cost me per X months, final value. No Commitment value AND some other payment value of which the relationship is unknown.
Keep it simple.

Also, you pay R100 commitment, but you fail to mention if you get that as a credit value? And what about the other payment in that Finance block?

It’s just not “there” for the user, i.e. not clear what the cost is…
All because of that “finance” block.

Also, does this commitment amount mean FOREVER? Or is it for some random period of time???

OK, hope you get it right….
(it’s usually easy to understand something that YOU designed; just remember to test it on users first….)

Sincerely,

David

Virgin Money ZA‘s site is awesome in comparison to Virgin Mobile ZA.

Analysis

They have changed their site a lot since then, but still, everyone I know does not understand how virgin mobile works! They are supposed to be “different” and “simpler”, but it’s just not coming out right.
Basically, they are confusing, and customers look and it and say “huh?” and then just walk away.

The site still suffers from too many input fields, options and dropdown boxes; and that’s suppose to be making cellular simpler?

You can read in the news how CellC seems to be performing poorly.

• Cell C’s signal fading fast
• CellC Downgraded [financially]

I sent them these emails back then, which they said they would forward to management, but probably didn’t. Which leads to the second reason they will go down – their 1) customer service people are useless.
(2) Not to mention they call them “Client Liaison Consultant”s, bleh)

Greetings,

No problem. Someone has to tell CellC what they are doing
wrong or right.

I can tell you one thing. Five free sms per day on your
website just does not cut it.
I have seen this single fact that Vodacom has 20 free sms a
day on their website be the deciding factor when people
choose what network that want to be on. I would seriously
consider changing your insufficient daily limit. It is not
that everyone uses all 20, it is just the fact that you
know it is there if you need it.

It is a pity that CellC is the only network that cannot
provide GPRS to prepaid customers. Here are a couple of
reasons why:
Firstly, the number of applications that require GPRS are
growing. Take mxit.co.za for example, the South African
company that is experiencing rapid growth in its services
worldwide.
Lastly, the million rand industries for ringtones/logos/etc
are usually heavily reliant on GPRS.
CellC is unfortunately missing these markets (and
customers).

Even if you have to bring out GPRS for prepaid customers at
a higher price than the competitors do, it is better than
nothing. In addition, it will prevent you from losing more
customers because of this factor.

You can bring these issues forward to management as well.

I look forward to hearing what comes of my views.

Sincerely,
David De Caires E Freitas

i.e.
3) Their website free sms doesn’t stimulate usage amongst users. (Only 5 free sms)
4) Way behind on their basic GPRS offerings when they should have woken up back then.
Clearly MXit Mobile was going to be huge, one could see it in 2005 already.

On Tue, 6 Sep 2005 10:06:17 +0200
“Customer Services” wrote:
>
> Good Day, David.
> Thank for taking the time to express your views as this
> is much
> appreciated and will be brought forward to management.
> Unfortunately we
> need to advise you of the reason why a Prepaid client is
> not able to
> make use of this services. As you may well be aware of
> the fact that all
> international call are billed in arrears and the use of
> GPRS is also
> billed in arrears we can not offer this service to our
> Prepaid clients
> as the cost for using the service is quite expensive and
> for this reason
> we urge our clients rather to take out a contract, if
> they wish to make
> use of this service.
> For any further assistance, please feel free to email us
> at
> [email]custserv@cellc.co.za[/email]
> Kind regards
> Nazeem Marshman
> Client Liaison Consultant

Look, if you make excuses and don’t listen, you ought to go down the drain. And if someone is giving you advice that would have you cost you thousands of Rands via some “consultant”, I would take it and RESPOND to it!

I can usually spot something that will float or sink before the time.

This was the first email I warned them with:

: Tue, 30 Aug 2005 10:33:55 +0200
To: “Customer Services”

Dear CellC co.

Thank you for responding, in due time.
I would recommend you put this information (about
international roaming on prepaid) on your website, so that
customers like me can find it out without having to waste
human resources.

I would like to take this opportunity to express my gradual
disappointments with CellC.
I have been a customer with CellC from the very beginning.
A prepaid customer albeit. Which it seems, CellC has no
consideration for, seeing that there are no services for
prepaid customers.
How can a cellular company be economically viable in South
Africa when they aren’t catering for the biggest market
segment?

Clearly CellC is not attempting to make a good impression
with ACTUAL service.
In times when 3G has been rolled out on other networks,
CellC cannot even provide 2G services for prepaid customers
yet. Absurd.

Never mind the fact that your customers have to PAY to have
their MMS settings sent to them?
Moreover, the fact that CellC MMS gprs does not work on my
simcard anymore is really pushing my irritation with CellC.
(The customer service people do not even listen to
customers, all they do is restate the lines given to them
by management. Might as well have answering machines.)

It is all good and well that you try to have ‘trendy’
adverts appealing to the youth and all. However, at the end
of the day, word of mouth, from people like me can make you
or break you. I have been pedalling CellC amongst peers,
trying to persuade them to use CellC ever since I started
using CellC. Nevertheless, CellC’s disregard for service
provision has made me reconsider. With millions of
customers choosing to go to the major network Vodacom, can
you really afford to lose more?

You should consider that prepaid customers usually become
or recommend your contract customers. I have experienced it
myself.
In addition, the prepaid customers will spawn into your
business customers eventually.
A customer like me, who has spent literally thousands of
Rands on prepaid, would like to know that he is
appreciated. Otherwise, my money could well be spent on a
network that actually has services available.

Maybe CellC is not quite ready yet, maybe one day you will
have people behind the scenes who actually know what they
are doing. But, till then, I have to reconsider. And put
that CellC Contract application on hold.

Sincerely,

David E Freitas

5 No appreciation for individual prepaid users who are recharging a lot. (Rewards or something)
6 I ripped them about their adverts: all the wasted money on promises, but no action/service helps no one.
7 No understanding of basic business principles.

8 The previous commenter was right probably – their careers are all BEE based. It’s not a charity, but a business, hire people who can make it work, regardless of colour. Else no-one is going to have work there.

Quick resolution?

Want a faster response to your query? Seems if you put it on HelloPeter.com, they will actually call you to help you. Because they don’t want to look bad on their website.

Send free CellC to CellC sms everyday.

About the author

David will tell you if your business is good/feasible in no uncertain terms and with high accuracy and amazing insight.

Verification of server certificate failed. Please check the date setting in your device.

Some solutions you could try:

• Check that the date on your phone is OK, i.e. the correct year and not last years date.

• Check your Date/Time setting and make sure it is set to update from the network.

• Lastly, try downloading Opera Mini again from mini.opera.com.

Phones that have experienced this: Nokia 6020.

The Problem

I noticed that dropdown boxes (<select> html elements with <option>’s) on Motorola phones were being shown as a list, instead of as the usual dropdown list that we are used to.

Normal dropdown box html	How a dropdown box should look like
<select> <option value="CellC">CellC</option> <option value="MTN">MTN</option> <option value="Vodacom4me">Vodacom</option> <option value="Virgin">Virgin Mobile</option> </select>	CellC MTN Vodacom Virgin Mobile

Motorola shows it “wrongly” like this instead:

CellC
MTN
Vodacom
Virgin Mobile

Which does waste a lot of space on the limited screen size of a mobile cellphone.

The Solution

Fix Method 1: Leave out the closing /option tags

This is the easiest way to fix, although it doesn’t make the markup XHTML, it is still valid HTML.
You have to leave out the closing OPTION tags.

Like so:

<select>
<option value="CellC">CellC
<option value="MTN">MTN
<option value="Vodacom4me">Vodacom
<option value="Virgin">Virgin Mobile
</select>

That’s it, the Motorola will then display the dropdown as a normal PC browser would.

Fix Method 2: Add a Optgroup

In HTML there is a cool <optgroup> tag. Which allows you to group items in a dropdown list.
Example:

        
v3
v360

        
        
6230i
7250i

        

So, to get the motorola to display a dropdown list as we would like it to, we just have to add one <optgroup> element to the <select>ion box.

Like this:

<select>
<optgroup>
<option value="CellC">CellC</option>
<option value="MTN">MTN</option>
<option value="Vodacom4me">Vodacom</option>
<option value="Virgin">Virgin Mobile</option>
</optgroup>
</select>

In PHP before generating the “option” tags I check if it’s a Motorola phone and do this:
if (strstr($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'], "MOT-")) {
echo '<optgroup>';
}
And remember to close it afterwards.

The Tools

Motorola actually has a browser / internet / xhtml / html-mobile / wml /wap simulator-emulator program so that you can test how your webpage / wappage will look on a Motorola.
It’s called the Motorola ADK (Application Developer Kit).

ADK Features

* Supports WML, cHTML and xHTML-basic
* Syntax Directed Editor and Script Debugger
* WML Script Compiler: 1.2.1 Compliance
* WML Script Debugging
* Incorporates actual browser components – to achieve Realistic Simulation capabilities across Motorola and other devices

Download the Motorola E398 ADK. Requires Login / registration first. Get Skip Registration here or Download Moto ADK directly.
The actual cellphone model / version of the ADK doesn’t matter as their browser is pretty much the same across all the phones. (V3, V3x razr, renders the same way as MOT-E398)

Happy testing!

I came across this problem because the contact quick list I have on my free sms sites (CellC, MTN, Vodacom) weren’t showing nicely on Motorolas. Now that’s all fixed

UPDATE: Added a new workaround. (exclude the closing </option> tags)

UPDATE: Get sms notifications of events on ANY calender! In fact, now you can schedule reminders for events on your personal calendar or any other calendar to which you’re subscribed.

NEW: Google calender mobile cellphone version!

Visit calendar.google.com on your mobile web browser.

• Multiple calendars on one account – so you can separate the different parts of your life/schedule (work, home, etc)
• Share events and calendars – You can let a calendar be show to the public or share a calendar with someone.
• Planning an event? – You can create invitations, send reminders and keep track of RSVPs right inside Google Calendar.

Now, the main reason for this post is the SMS/text notifications you can setup for any event! And it costs you nothing!

Staying on schedule
You can set up automatic event reminders, including mobile phone notifications, and instantly bring up anything on your calendar with the built-in search tool.

And they support all three networks in SA – MTN, CellC and Vodacom.

How to enable SMS notifications

• Login to Google Calendar with your Google Account details (same as your GMail)
• Click Settings at the top right.
• In the Calendar Settings page click on the Notifications button.
• Then enter your cell phone details and follow the instructions.
• You’re done. Now any notifications you put on an event will come in an SMS/text to your cellphone. All for free!

Poor Google has to foot the bill for all the SMSs sent. I wonder how viable it will turn out to be?

• Google Calendar Tour
• mycee.co.za – The guy who told me about this cool feature!
• goosync.com – You can sync Google Calendar to your mobile device for free as well.

The easiest way is to go to www.mxit.co.za/wap/ on your computer and proceed to download. It should tell you “Load v5.0 for Nokia-6270″
When you click Normal at the end of all the questions it will give a .jad file to save.
Save this .jad file to your computer, then
open that .jad file in MPowerPlayer!
This always works!

You will have to do this everytime you want to run MXit Ver. 5 on your computer

If you don’t want to download MXit everytime you want to Run MXit v5 then follow these instructions:
Yes, the .jar file linked to in the .jad expires after a while. So you need to save it on your computer because it expires on the server.

Here’s howto:

1. Open the .jad file in Notepad,
2. then download the file specified in it next to “MIDlet-Jar-URL: ”
   (Copy paste that URL into your internet browser; for example: http://ww2.mxit.co.za/wap/client/source/4195495727f67.jar)
3. Then, change the “MIDlet-Jar-URL: ” line in notepad to just have the XXXXXX.jar part in it. (for example “MIDlet-Jar-URL: 4195495727f67.jar”.
4. Then have the .jar you downloaded and the .jad in the same directory, and open the .jad file in MPowerPlayer.

There we go

OR, If you are desperate to use any MXit, you can still use the old MXit V3.0 .jar!
Download this MXit jar (or this MXit jar) to your computer and open it with MPowerPlayer!
OR
MXit V3 – MPowerPlayer Quick Start Link
MXit V3 – MPowerPlayer Quick Start Link – Slower.

————————-
You can change your number on MXit 5 via MPowerPlayer by doing the following:

* Download MXit from www.mxit.co.za/wap from your PC. (You will save a .jad file to your computer)

* Open the .jad file with Notepad.

* Change this line:
MIDlet-1: MXit,/icon.png,MXit
to something like:
MIDlet-1: MXitDEF,/icon.png,MXit
which makes MPowerPlayer think it is a new program and won’t remember your login number.

* Save the .jad file.

Open the .jad in MPowerPlayer (File->Open).

.
You will have to do this change everytime you want to use that number you associated with MXitDEF. Beause the .jar link in the .jad expires after a while.

————————-

And so, I’ve created the third sms wap site! wap.defza.com/mtn

By popular demand (ok, a few requests), I created a free mtn.co.za interface for their 5 free daily sms. It wasn’t as bad as I thought.

What’s cool about registering on mtn.co.za is that anyone can register (i.e. even vodacom and CellC customers).

MTN give you 5 free sms per day to other MTN numbers.

MTNwap!

wap.defza.com/mtn

Just one left now… virgin mobile ZA!

Some people would tell me they couldn’t scroll on some of my wap pages sometimes, and it’s not exactly easy to reproduce if you don’t have a Motorola to test with

So, I saw it came up on the hawhaw mailing list: groups.yahoo.com/group/hawhaw and decided to test it.

Here is what I found…

Thanks, looks like I’ve found something.

SUMMARY: Don’t use “position:relative;” in CSS for a mobile page for some Motorola’s.

See, wap.defza.com/test/1.php (and up to 7.php).

A motorola V3 Razr fails to scroll on every one except the 7.php one;

The difference: the main <div> looks like this on the broken ones:
<div style=”text-align:left; position:relative;”>
The one that works has
<div style=”"> So, clearly it’s an issue with DIVs and STYLEs on some Motorola’s;

I tested more to see if it’s “text-align:” causing the issue or “position:”.
I used wap.defza.com/test/a.php (up to d.php) for this;

a.php and c.php are OK. b.php and d.php FAIL on the V3 Razr.

The difference:
b and d have “position:relative” in either the div class or the .body CSS.

So, the fix would be to NOT have “position:relative” as a style in a WAP page for some Motorola’s.

The value of text-align: does not affect this bug.

I see in the hawhaw.inc file it says:

// position:relative is needed to work-around MSIE’s Peekaboo bug …

What version of IE is this referring to?
I removed it from my hawhaw.inc and it seems fine in IE.

Glad this is hopefully solved

Cheers,

David

There is nothing the end-user can do about this issue, but if you do find a webpage that can’t scroll on your Motorola at least you know what to suggest as a fix to the website owner

Motorola, I hope you’ve fixed this bug already!

UPDATE:

It has been fixed already!

I contacted MPowerPlayer, and it got fixed
So, everything back to normal, people
No changes needed. Just File->Exit and relaunch the player and it should update to the newest version.

Thanks so much — with that I was able to duplicate and fix the problem

Please update to the latest (1199) and you should be all set.

Thanks again,
- Michael

———

Well, if you want to know how to logout or use MPowerPlayer on one computer for different MXit users then…
Click here for more info!

At least this bug was good for something: It made me write up how to login with multiple accounts on MXit with MPowerPlayer!

Something I learnt recently: The noisiest wheel gets the most attention.

People seem to look for help with MXit anywhere that there is a “Submit” button available.

Even the network providers get inandated with calls for help with MXit!

Here are your choices for help with MXit:

1) www.mxit.co.za/wap – This page has phone information, set up settings, MXit free download and more.

2) forum.mxit.co.za – The forum. Here you can ask anything you want. There is a great guy, Glenn, who is just waiting to help you!

Either way, you will get help setting up your mobile cellphone.

So, if you are having MXit problems, you know where to go

Good luck and enjoy…

Welcome to the evolution.