CPC Orders MTN to pay Ultimate Wonder Promo winner N1.85m

The Consumer Protection Council (CPC) of Nigeria has demanded mobile telecoms giant, MTN Communications Limited pay one million, eight hundred and fifty Naira (N1,850,000) to one of the winners of its Ultimate Wonder Promo for lack of due diligence.

The order from CPC came on the heels of a complaint brought by Omeje Chukwuma Fidelis against MTN Nigeria that he had been underpaid after he was declared winner of N2 million in the said sales promotion, which was held in 2012.

Omeje said he participated in the promo and was called through MTN line 180 on October 10, 2012 to be told he had won N2million in the Ultimate Wonder Promo. On October 12 of the same year he got a text message informing him of the presentation ceremony fixed for October 19 at the Nicon Luxury Hotel, Abuja.

According to Omeje, he asserted that during the said ceremony, he was presented with a dummy cheque of N2million with his name on it, interviewed and paraded before the media and the world as the winner of said amount.

He said he received another call from MTN line 180 on November 2, 2012 to be told that he actually won N150,000 and was thereafter given a Verve ATM card for that amount.

MTN denied the claim, saying that Omeje was from the outset informed that his winning was N150,000 and that the complainant deceitfully presented himself when winners in the N2million category were called forward on the day of the prize presentation.

MTN said when it discovered what Omeje had done he was thereafter contacted through its 180 line on his misrepresentation, pursuant to which he apologised.

CPC demanded the call data of the communications of the 10th of October 2012 when Omeje was informed of his winnings of N150,000, but MTN failed, refused and neglected to comply with the request made both in 2012 and 2016.

The CPC stated that “in the absence of this material evidence which is solely in the possession of the respondent the CPC must resolve the issue in favour of the complainant.”

It further declared that the “the process of the MTN Ultimate Wonder Promotion whereby the verification exercise was conducted after winners were identified, declared and winnings presented publicly is grossly flawed, lacking in transparency, inequitable and apparently calculated to deceive consumers.”

CPC, on the strength of these observations, therefore directed MTN to pay within 14 days of receipt of its order, the sum of N1,850,000 “being the unpaid part of the two million Naira prize won by the complainant in the 2012 MTN Ultimate Wonder Promotion.”

Source: Consumer Protection Council