I don’t know where to start sah. We are a dedicated staff that have sacrificed a lot and are still giving our best just to make sure that customer satisfaction is met. But the company has not at any given time recognised that. We have been suffering, are suffering and are going to suffer if this inhuman treatment we receiving from management is not put to a stop.
Here are just a few points that I want to point out because if I want to write all that is going wrong at Africell, we will be sending out invitations to the launch of a book entitled AFRICELL BAAH CHI BEETI MU BON BE BOHA MBONAAT CHI BIRR.
Can you believe that Africell is paying agents that have been working with them for four years less than D3000? We work six days a week, seven hours a day even on public holidays. We have worked from the tobaski of 2012 to the tobaski of 2013 in between there were 18 public holidays that they refused to pay us.
For more than three years, Africell have not provided even a single kettle for the call center. Agents contribute and buy them if not we won’t drink tea or coffee. We have more than one hundred agents and the call center operates 24 hours. The provisions are provided once every three months and sometimes they buy the 5kg sugar of 1kg (D30) from shopping centers and three packets of tea bag and maybe three small tins of coffee for the three shifts to share.
Last year, the proprietor of Africell was on a visit to The Gambia and he was taken to all the departments except the call center which was and is always messy. They paraded the 222 (choose your number) agents at the main hall as the call center agents.
Maybe some of you are not aware the call center is now outsourced and being managed by Mrs. Amie Singateh who happens to be Mr. Badara Mbye's(MD Africell) wife.
Before she took over, we had a meeting with her and she ‘killed’ us with lots of promises which turned out to be false ( ma nyaka suma.... Amie yow call center yeb ala wedi billahi).
Africell has never paid for any agent to further his or her education and now the policy at the call center is if you want to pay for your studies you are asked to resign and the funny thing is the guy who is a party to this policy, Mr. Kutubo Keita is now going to school. He did not resign.
You may not believe this but the call center agents sit on plastic chairs for seven hours every day and guess what? Almost all the chairs are broken so we have to double then in order to be able to use them. Some of the stations are without chairs as you can see from the pictures below.
The tap we use to fetch water for our dispenser has been spoiled six months ago (see pictures to believe what I am saying). I won’t tell you where we fetch water but it’s a disgrace. Belie, as I am typing I feel like crying because the first day I got that call from Africell that I should go for an interview, I thought that my life was going to change not knowing that I was joining a company that treats its staff like slaves.
Just recently, redundancy was made at the call center because they said they were going to reduce the number of calls we were offered per day. We were 43 agents per shift and no agent receives less that 300 calls, sometimes we were sent 27,000, yes twenty-seven thousand calls per day. But the calls are back to normal. Let me just stop here. Suma holl dafa fess. This is part one and i have part 2 to 10 to come.
Let me end with this this. The four days that were declared as public holidays during the last tobaski are yet to be paid and i can guarantee you that they are not going to pay all. Laaa dama fateh sa, we were also supposed to be paid bonus but they refused to pay. One of the Lebanese guys( this time it was Kamil, one of the most useless Lebanese in The Gambia) will send a mail and say that he called the call center and the agents failed to pick his call or picked and said aha lo buga, without saying:Good morning Africell call center , so and so speaking how may I help you. So we are not paid our bonuses because of those flimsy excuses.
Part two coming soon!
Written by an Africell insider
Kairaba Avenue
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