The Consumer Council of Zimbabwe (CCZ) has accused the organisers of the just-ended OK Grand Challenge Jackpot Promotion of taking consumers for granted by allegedly failing to provide coupons at some of their branches due to information technology (IT) problems.
BY SILENCE CHARUMBIRA
In a statement, CCZ complaints officer Tare Moyo alleged OK failed to issue an apology to consumers for failing to print coupons for some of its competitions.
“At the onset of the OK Grand Challenge Jackpot Promotion and during its course, there were challenges with the OK Zimbabwe IT system, which resulted in them not printing coupons for their customers.
“Consumers from various parts of the country failed to get coupons that would enable them to enter into the various competitions offered by OK Zimbabwe and its partners, the main reason why they bought from OK and shunned others grocery stores,” CCZ said.
“Despite the consumer watchdog requesting OK Zimbabwe to apologise to consumers through the Press, requesting people to come and collect their coupons, they were not forthcoming.”
CCZ said it was deeply concerned that OK Zimbabwe had not shown any customer care.
“They neither put in-branch adverts with the countdown message as they had promised nor a Press statement with an apology, an explanation of why people could not get coupons and a countdown message,” said CCZ.
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“Once again, this is an indication of how consumers continue to be taken for granted by big corporates who clearly show more interest in huge profits than customer care. Consumers need to act wisely to ensure that they get a fair share of their hard-earned money.”
OK Zimbabwe chief operating officer Albert Katsande confirmed they had system challenges at some of their branches in the early stages of the promotion.
“We confirm that we indeed had some system problems at some of our branches in the early part of the promotion where some of our customers could not access their participation coupons, but these were resolved,” said Katsande.
He said in addition to their in-store public address system, they flighted countdown advertisements in the Press on May 22 and 29.
“We acknowledge communicating with CCZ advising them of the action we were taking and had taken,” Katsande said.
He said it was unfortunate there were allegations that they did not take the necessary action to ensure their customers received the coupons in time for the finale.
Katsande said OK Zimbabwe took the promotion seriously and would not want to tarnish its image by not taking corrective action where needed.
