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Dear KPN,

My name is Annabel, I am an Australian and British citizen with a Dutch residency. I have been a customer with KPN for almost 24 months. My phone has recently broken and I need a new one. The shops are not open because of the lockdown so I called KPN to organise a new phone under a new contract only to be told I was unable to (regardless of the fact I am existing customer) over the phone. I could only do that if I was a Dutch citizen. No one could explain why. 

Your customer centre team were somewhat help and agreed it was a form of discrimination. When this case was escalated, a customer service specialist called to tell me they were the rules and didn’t try to change my mind when I said I would go to Vodafone because I need a working phone for work and we are under a lockdown - nothing is open. The blunt call was over in 5 minutes. 

Why do you have this policy in place? Please explain how this is not a form of discrimination towards customers that are not Dutch nationals? This is a corporate governance question.

I await your reply.

Annabel Murphy 

Any response KPN? Response from Customer Service or Governance? I am a journalist so I a skilled at following up. 

@AMurphy Hi goodmorning Annabel, welcome! Thank you for reaching out. It's very busy at our forum at the moment, that's why we weren't able to react sooner in your topic. I'm glad to help you nevertheless, and I'm sorry to hear that your phone is broken.

We accept a variety of ID’s, but there are a few restrictions as to which one can be used with online or phone ordering. This has to do with the technical limitations of our systems and is not meant to be discriminatory. You can read more about it right here.  

I may have an alternative for you. Not all KPN stores are closed, some are open for appointments. You can check the KPN stores right here on our website, and plan the appointment there as well. I hope you're able to solve it that way, I can imagine very well you can't do without a phone for too long.

Hello Alexandra,

Thank you for your response and offer to try to help my situation. After speaking wth three customer service people - including some sort of manager who called me back to discuss it - not one person mentioned it was a ‘technical limitations of our systems’. In fact, I am if I recall correctly KPN support staff may have agreed with me that is was discriminatory and other Dutch telco also in-force this rule. People (engineers, developers) write technical systems, they can write in details to make it possible to accept Dutch residency cards over the phone. This is particularly important in times when most shops are closed. 

I was very disappointed with KPN for this. A technical excuse is not right, I think it’s to prevent fraud or something like that. I am looking at other options to move my mobile and TV/Internet package to be honest. 

Regards,

Annabel 

@AMurphy Hi Annabel. I get where you're coming from and can imagine that you see it that way. If I had another option to offer you or different way to help you, I would gladly have offered it. I hope you're able to make an appointment in a KPN store soon to solve the whole situation, so that you won't have to do without a phone for (much) longer.

I’ve gone to find a phone elsewhere already. 

I believe this is a serious issue that should be escalated to the Board of KPN. This is not a technical issue - this is discriminating (preventing someone/ a customer from buying a phone online because of his/her nationality). 

I know you personally can’t offer me anything else but you can highlight this to a senior level for the reasons I have explained in this message board. 

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