OF TECHNOLOGY AND THE CHALLENGE OF INTEGRITY

Am sure anyone that has tried online shopping in Uganda has a story to tell; it all starts lovey dovey but usually the last one is not a good one. I have tried a few of these options myself, Jumia, jiji and other Telco provider related options like paying for insurance. Please understand that in technology I am above average in terms of understanding as well as handling. I have also had my fair share of customer service training and have actually been at the provider side of things; so, I have run the whole 9 yards.

One of the online shopping portals was a hit with me when I started using it. I delayed for a while to start as I was apprehensive about getting unreturnable substandard goods and the other pains potentially hidden in this way of working. I was also worried about the ability of Ugandan service providers to take ownership of their mistakes. Anyhow, I somehow got bittne by the bug and soon as was a firm believer until I placed an order that was only partially delivered.

My biggest shock was the cycles I was taken through by the call center to simply fix a simple missing product issue. Their delivery person had mis-declared the delivery, lied to them that I had signed (obviously they forged my signature) and then they closed the sale in their system. I labored to explain to their call center (it is the only way you can reach them) the issue to no avail. They actually treated my suspect at one point. They have this one standard response when you corner them that goes something like this "we shall ask the dispatch department to handle this and call you back". They never ever call back. So, I called multiple times until I got tired of calling. I then reached out to their CEO on another social media platform and levelled my complaint. To his credit, he immediately got back, was apologetic and promised to get this resolved. His people called me immediately and took me again through exactly the same cycle of madness! I resigned and have never used the platform again, and they still owe me!

Recently, insurance has made a provision for using the Mobile Money platforms. I learned with pleasure that I could now pay my motor insurance using my phone directly and then have my sticker printed by an insurer. I was taken through this by one staff of an insurance firm and I successfully paid for my motor 3rd party using this method and within less than 5 minutes I was off with sticker in hand. A few weeks later I found that I needed to pay for insurance for another car. I had insufficient funds with the first mobile money provider I had used the last time, so I opted to use my other number with another provider.

First of all the process of debiting my mobile money account happened so fast, but I got no message alert with the insurance reference number. I waited for about 10 minutes and nothing came through. I walked away thinking the service provider had some issues and would send me the reference later; that was never to be. I contacted the telco call center, which by the way is as hard as a needle in a haystack to reach and there was not much help. I reached out to someone internal to the telco and to date, 3 weeks down the road I have received no Insurance reference number, so I can't print my sticker in spite of having settled my dues! Each time I reach out, I have been told that they are working on this; it’s the same response I get whenever I follow this matter up with the Telco.

Now I am wondering how many such cases exist? who is following these issues up? are the regulators aware of these scums or do we even have these transactions regulated at all? I have no issues with innovation, but innovation must be held to account, especially where it involves holding onto hard earned monies of people that work so hard for them. One wonders who is responsible for looking out for this kind of poor, possibly fraudulent transactions that are ripping Ugandans off of their hard-earned income.

So, as it stands, I have struck two innovators of great products off my list and I am wondering if we shall have more to follow. Something must be done to protect our very fragile transactional systems as electronic payment methods ease life in so many different ways, therefore they must be encouraged. But if people keep getting bad experiences like these, and the places where they should be running to for help are deliberately kept very hard to reach for them, what will happen next? how does that help the confidence of people with the next great innovations to come out of dear country? Is this not the reason why our innovations are for sale to the next biggest bidders out there who buy them from our great minds for peanuts and then re-brand them as their own, and then proceed to make a killing out of them?

Something must be done to save the genuine innovators but also protect the people that so badly want to transact electronically who right now may be standing at cross roads about Ugandan innovations in the electronic transactional space.

Someone regulate these frauds out of here. Make it very expensive for any one to sell air in Uganda!