Safaricom Home Fibre: A Nightmare of Unending Outages and Zero Compensation

I’ve told you time and again, ceaselessly, about how Safaricom Home Fibre is the most reliable home internet solution. I’ve done it through tweets, through video, and through articles on this site. But here I am with the title of this article complaining about my seemingly un-ending outages, wondering about a way forward. It is annoying, it is frustrating, it is demoralizing. The past few weeks have had me wonder what the hell happened with the good service I used to get! What the hell is going on? Why is my area experiencing very frequent downtimes? Why isn’t Safaricom treating it with utmost urgency?

In this digital age, reliable internet connectivity is not just a luxury; it’s a necessity. I don’t overpay Safaricom because I am using internet as a luxury. And even if I was paying for speeds as a luxury, am I not entitled to reliable, consistent, good quality connection?

Unfortunately, my experience with Safaricom Home Fibre has been nothing short of a nightmare, marked by frequent outages, poor service quality, and a glaring lack of communication from the service provider.

At the bottom of this article, I’ve shared a copy of the email I sent to the Communication Authority a few hours ago. Read it, and amplify it. I think it could be the only way to push for a robust re-evaluation of the services we receive from our internet providers. Hopefully we get to a point where customers get compensation – true compensation – whenever services are down.

A timeline of issues:

In February, this happened. This was the first time Safaricom 400 told me I wasn’t automatically going to get mobile data because of a service interruption.

They had, the customer care rep said, to evaluate the issue. Meanwhile, I had no Internet for over 3 hours. No one called later on to apologize or explain. It was just a loss of signal, and my money was gone for those hours.

There were other minor outages through March, April, May and June, but let’s focus on July 2024. This is me on 10th July 2024.

I had had a red light (loss of signal) almost every day. There had been no calls or apologies, or explanations. At least for those 7 days the red light would resolve and I would have Internet – let’s not talk about the fluctuation of speeds. But after tweeting the above, things went from bad to worse:

Day 3 came and went:

Day 4:

Do you want to know how long it took to fix the situation? 10 minutes. No, for real. A technician came over on day 5 and took 10 minutes to have the whole building issue sorted. I was promised compensation, no one followed up. I was told the issue had been fixed and would certainly never happen again. But no!

6 days later the red light was back.

if you think this time it took a few hours, nope. It took literally two days, and some hours. I had to leave the house and go work from somewhere else.

What exactly is the issue with my Home Fibre?

I didn’t say this at the beginning but as I write this I’ve had an outage from 10am to 1pm. Same red light outage. So, seemingly, the issue hasn’t been sorted. I am tired.

What I hate most about this new outage is it happened just after paying for my subscription. As usual, I overpaid. I want to be automatically charged, without any interruptions. After over a week of no problems, I had felt pretty confident that the issue had been sorted and that there would be no outages going forward. I was so wrong.

There has been no detailed explanation as to what the issue is. A “fibre cut” is the excuse I get. Which if you think of it makes zero sense. You don’t just start experiencing fibre cuts left and right. It means there’s either sabotage, incompetence, or both.

Consider other options:

I know, everyone keeps saying, just switch. But what options do I have? I pay Safaricom for 40Mbps. I know Starlink can give me better, but I am not sure about what to do with them during outages. Also, the initial Starlink budget is quite high – I am planning on getting it for relatives upcountry.

My thought has been to get a backup provider. I called Zuku who are already in my building – the phone wasn’t answered, and they took 9 days to get back to me. I then called a couple of these newer providers like Dimensions etc. and they’re yet to do a study to see if their services have expanded to my building.

What does proper compensation look like:

When you pay for Home Internet, you’re paying for each second of those 30 days. You’re supposed to have an assured 99.9% uptime. If you have a smart home, like many people do, a lot of things require that connection to communicate and work. From door alarms, to smart cameras, to TVs to air purifiers and more. Each time you have no internet, all these fail.

Proper compensation should mean receiving your money back for each of the seconds that you didn’t have internet. Sharing with me 5GB of mobile data that is depleted in less than an hour is crazy in 2024. It should be done as goodwill, not compensation.

If data was the way forward, then 5GB is too little especially for customers who already pay more than 20Mbps. If data is the way forward, then there should be a way to link it up to the router to have things continue running in the house. If data is the way forward, then ensure each customer gets an equivalent to their average daily spend since you have access to this information.

The proper approach should be a refund of credits for each second of the month where internet was not available. It is what will deter companies from not sorting out outages in time.

Escalating this to the Communication Authority:

I’ve just sent the following email to the Communication Authority of Kenya complaining about Safaricom Home Fibre. This comes after 5 outages in the last 30 days. I’ve documented each of the outages in a series of tweets and a series of phone calls to 400 helpline.

Subject: Safaricom Home Fibre Down Times without Compensation

Hello

I am writing to formally lodge a complaint regarding the persistent and unacceptable downtime of Safaricom Home Fibre services that I and many customers in my area have been experiencing. As a paying customer who relies heavily on a stable internet connection for work and daily activities, the frequent outages have caused significant disruption and inconvenience.

In the past two months,  I have encountered more than four instances of complete service outages. Despite these interruptions, there has been a notable lack of communication from Safaricom, with no notifications or explanations provided to customers. Moreover, there has been no offer of compensation or refunds for the periods during which the service was completely unavailable.

As I write this, there's a red light on my router and I've had no internet for about 3 hours. That's not bad. In July there was an outage that lasted over four days, during which I experienced a complete loss service. Despite contacting Safaricom customer support multiple times, the issue remained unresolved for an unacceptably long duration. Such downtime contradicts the assurance given to customers. Such downtimes should not be acceptable in this country at all. 

This situation raises several serious concerns:

1. Lack of Communication: Safaricom has failed to communicate effectively with customers during outages. There is no proactive notification or timely updates about the status of the service and expected resolution times.
2. No Compensation or Refunds: Despite the prolonged periods of downtime, there has been no mention of compensation or refund for the affected days. This is unfair to customers who pay for uninterrupted service. Sending 5GB of data - after calls and complaints - is not a solution to home internet connectivity. 
3. Service Reliability: The frequent and prolonged outages indicate a fundamental issue with the reliability of the service. Customers should be assured of a stable connection, especially when they rely on it for work from home.

Given these points, I request the Communication Authority of Kenya to take the following actions:

1. Investigation: Conduct a thorough investigation into the frequent outages and the overall reliability of Safaricom Home Fibre services. The results should be made public, and serious action taken. 
2. Accountability: Hold Safaricom accountable for their failure to provide the promised level of service and for their lack of communication with customers. 
3. Compensation Policy: Mandate Safaricom to establish a clear policy for compensating customers for downtime, including automatic refunds or credits for prolonged outages.
4. Feedback Mechanism: Implement a robust feedback mechanism that allows customers to follow up on their complaints and receive timely responses from the Communication Authority. I want to be able to know the status of this complaint, timeline for resolution and actions taken.

I would appreciate a prompt response to this complaint and information on the steps being taken to address these issues. It is crucial that paying customers are not left in the dark and that there are mechanisms in place to ensure we receive the service we pay for. 

Thank you for your attention to this matter. I look forward to your response.

Yours sincerely,
Dickson Otieno 
Safaricom HOME FIBRE Account - 11128102

I don’t know what sort of response I’ll get but I will keep updating this post with whatever comes my way.