A scandalous disgrace

BARBARA HARMEL, COUNSELLING PSYCHOLOGIST, WRITES: I read your piece on the Auckland Park’s resident problem with Telkom with great interest. I was not as fortunate.

On August 29, my landline died on me. I reported it to Telkom, emphasising that my landline is an emergency line as I am a psychologist and can expect to receive life or death calls – from patients threatening suicide. They noted mine was a medical line and said they would attend to it immediately. They have not.

In the meantime, I learned only six days later that a patient of mine had in fact made a serious attempt on her life and had been institutionalised.

Her attending psychiatrist, who did not have my cellphone number, had tried to reach me repeatedly on my landline and had left messages on it for me – none of which I could access.

This too I reported to Telkom. I phoned daily, sometimes more than daily. On each call to their call centre, I was told a different “story” – each of which confirmed it was being looked into but was a common problem in the neighbourhood.

I went to their centres in both Rosebank and Cresta where I was told that they did not deal with faults. They are almost exclusively shops, selling Telkom mobile gadgets of various sorts.

I was also told that Telkom was no longer repairing lines that are dependent on cables and in areas which are close to ones of “high criminality” – like Westbury.

I live in Westdene which is unfortunately close to Westbury. MWeb, my internet server, confirmed this, telling me they had already lost a great many customers, because their internet service is dependent on Telkom.

I was further told that only in wealthy areas would fibre optics be installed by Telkom.

In the light of this information, I finally cancelled my landline, most reluctantly.

Not only am I a psychologist still in practice, I am also what is considered among the elderly, at almost 73 years old. It is extremely cumbersome to be dependent entirely on a cellphone and on a mobile modem gadget for internet.

This is an absolutely disgraceful, scandalous state of affairs on the part of Telkom.

Thank you so much for highlighting a part of the state of affairs at Telkom.