We have China telecom service for our land-line phone and DSL.  I also have a mobile internet card for my computer for a PC card modem.  The mobile internet was transferred from China Unicom, a mobile phone provider, to China Telecom about a year or so ago, in a government reshuffling of the telephone business, in China.

When we added ADSL, about two years ago, we were required to pay a year’s service, upfront.  Six months or so into that contract, Ayu noticed that China Telecom had also been charging one of my bank accounts for the ADSL.  She called and went visiting China Telecom for several weeks before they refunded the money, which took several more weeks.  Over the ensuing year plus, Ayu has discovered repeated events of overcharging my account for services, and it always takes repeated visits and phone calls, in order to get it straightened out.

Indeed, part of the overcharging and other problems has been problems with charging, not charging, or overcharging my bank account for my mobile internet service.  Then, about two months ago, I reprogrammed my computer, and I lost the software for the PC card.  After repeated misleads by China Telecom, we were not able to get new software.  Part of the problem has been that they have moved on to 3G, and the card did not support that. So, we asked, what can we do to get 3G card, and more quickly and efficiently solve the problem.  After several misleads by China Telecom, on that, we just went to the computer center and bought a new 3G card.

While that should have solved the problem, it turned out that there was an ongoing problem with charging the SIM card from my bank account.  Remember, now, that China Telecom has been deducting charges for telephone service, internet service and mobile internet service for over a year.  For several weeks, Ayu has been spending several phone calls a day trying to get the SIM card charged, but the telephone company keeps telling her that they cannot charge my bank account for the SIM charges because the name in the account differs from the name on my bank account.  This is not even a new problem.  Even though China Telecom had been deducting money from that bank account, they said they could not refund money to that account because of the name difference, never mind that they also have my passport number on the accounts.  The problem in name is simply that the Bank stamp on my account puts my middle name last.  All tolled, it has been about a month and a half of this nonsense. The problem is still not resolved, including two phone calls from different people at China Telecom, today.  And the easiest thing to do, in my mind, is just to go back to the computer center, tomorrow, and buy a new SIM card, not registered to anyone, with one year’s service built in.

Anyone who thinks that China will rule the business and financial world has, obviously, never been to China.