Globe lays down measures to protect prepaid subscribers

MANILA, Philippines - As a proactive measure to assist its subscribers in closely monitoring their prepaid credits or load, Globe Telecom is actively promoting an efficient tool to help them track their load balance and trace their usage.

KD Dizon, head of Globe Prepaid, said in a recent interview on national television that the prepaid service called “Load Watch” was introduced early this year to notify prepaid customers through timely reminders and updates on remaining load balance through text.

“Pioneered by Globe, Load Watch provides timely information to our prepaid subscribers so they are duly reminded of their load credits and validity dates, and that they can maximize use of their remaining load,” Dizon said.

She said Load Watch is an initiative of Globe to protect its subscribers and as a preventive measure against perceptions of vanishing load.

“We want to ensure that every peso in prepaid credit of our customers are well accounted for and fully utilized as intended whether for calls, texts or mobile surfing on our modernized network,” said Dizon. “With Globe as their provider, our subscribers feel secure and ahead of the curve.”

Mario Domingo, head of IT Transformation Strategy, said another way of curbing what prepaid customers perceive as vanishing load is through an innovative solution called “rollover policy” which is exclusively offered by Globe Telecom.

“The rollover policy of Globe ensures unused load credits are carried over to the subscriber’s new prepaid load credit once a reload is done. This effectively makes load validity longer for the unused load credits. The subscriber, however, will have to top up before the end of load validity to enjoy the rollover of credits,” said Domingo.

Globe is the only Philippine telco to set up this kind of policy for the benefit of prepaid subscribers. This protects subscribers who are not able to use up their prepaid load on time, but maintain an active loading activity.

For example, a prepaid subscriber loads P3 valid for three days. If the subscriber consumes only P1 within the validity period, the current practice would have rendered the remaining P2 as expired, giving subscribers the perception of vanishing load.

By topping up before the third day of any amount, the Globe rollover policy allows the remaining P2 to be carried over along with the new load credit onto the next validity period. Subscribers therefore efficiently use up their entire load credits, giving them best value for money.

Domingo offered these tips to Globe prepaid customers on how to maximize their load:

• Top up the day before the existing load ends its validity. This is the best way to avoid unnecessary load termination. As long as you top up for every balance you have, it carries over to the next cycle. Also, the bigger the denomination of the load, the longer the time of its validity.

As a guide to Globe prepaid subscribers, the following is the load validity per denomination: P1 to P10, three days; P11 to P50, 15 days; P51 to P100, 30 days; P101 to P150, 45 days; P151 to P250, 60 days; P251 to P300, 75 days; and P301 or more, 120 days.

• Be aware of how much load you consume and load only what you can use up. Dizon echoed Domingo’s advice that in this age of “tingi” load, a prepaid subscriber should never have to spend more than what he needs. Globe allows its prepaid subscribers to top up as low as P1 a day to make sure they consume what they pay for.

Still at the end of the day, she said that even with a Load Watch notification, “it is still up to the customer to perform due diligence and choose the appropriate amount to top up.”

• Read promo offers sent through text thoroughly. Say you availed yourself of a free trial subscription from third-party partners of Globe offering ringback tones or wallpapers. It happened that the next time you received the same offer, you accepted it, but this time you were being informed that you were going to be charged for the offer. Subscribers should make sure to read the entire message before accepting or agreeing to any offer. Availing yourself of any offer typically provides great value to subscribers. According to Globe, it continues to provide the most value for money in any offering it extends to its customers.