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Vodafone UK - Source: Reuters
Vodafone has apologised to its customers after pleading guilty to 21 charges under the Fair Trading Act at the Auckland District Court today.
The charges laid by the Commerce Commission relate to various
claims made by the telco about its broadband and mobile services
between 2006 and 2009.
Vodafone said it never meant to mislead anyone, but admits it did
not communicate clearly with customers with its ''broadband
everywhere'' campaign.
"We take these charges very seriously and we apologise to our customers," said Vodafone's Marketing Director Greg Campbell.
"As a company that strives to provide a great experience to our customers, we know we can do better, and we will.
"We have been working hard to improve our processes. We are very focused on making sure that our communication is clear and that our systems support the offers we have in the market."
The telecommunications giant will be sentenced on September 10.
Each of the 21 charges carries a maximum penalty of $200,000.
In the second of six cases the Commerce Commission is taking against Vodafone, the company was fined $81,900 for misleading the public over its $1 a day mobile internet plan in November.
The Commerce Commission said customers thought they were paying "$1 a day" for 10 megabytes of data on its Vodafone Live service, when in fact they were charged $1 after only using 2% of the 10MB.
The company apologised that its communication around the $1 a day offer was not as clear as it should have been.
In the first case, Vodafone pleaded guilty and was fined over $400,000 for misleading customers over the cost of its internet service.