Since March this year, Maxis was drawn into a public relations crisis when one of its user by the name of ‘Jackson5759' shared his discontent on the Lowyat Forum. The article alleged that Maxis treated disinterested customers better than loyal customers. The article then went viral on social media and incited anger among hundreds of users.

Over the course of four days after Maxis made an official statement on Facebook, it was greeted with 7,400 angry emojis and 3,200 comments, with many expressing disappointment and vowing service termination.

Asymmetry of information

Asymmetry of information happens when information is distributed unequally. It takes place in every segment of societies on a daily basis, but what make this particular incident exceptionally provocative is that the article posted on the Lowyat Forum which shaped the public opinion that Maxis allegedly deliberately manipulated the flow of information.

According to the article, while the company’s specialised team can actively engage selected users to pitch more attractive plans for higher customer retention rate, ordinary users are unable to access similar information despite proactively inquiring through various customer service channel. Worse of all, the flow of information was in favour of disinterested users who seek to disengage with the company rather than those who are loyal to the company.

Official statement - poor choice of words and methods

In light of the wide circulation of the article, Maxis made an official statement on Facebook to refute accusation made against the company. The statement surprisingly starts with an aggressively defensive sentence that reads “You may have read of an exaggerated Maxis save offer in the lowyat.net forum that has been circulating recently”.

The choice of the word ‘exaggerated’ at the beginning of the statement with the aim of alleviating tension not only failed to realise its value but rather added fuel to the fire when the article poster challenged Maxis into further elaborating which part of the article is ‘exaggerative’, and many netizens sympathised with the poster and defended his stance.

Further down after the opening, Maxis has put forth various explanations to refute accusations that the company has adopted an unhealthy method of competition in the market. However, none of explanations has brought a direct relief effect to the anger-inciting issue surrounding the discussion of ‘should disinterested customer who threaten to leave be given a candy whereas a loyal customer be given a stick for being loyal’.

In the eyes of many, the official statement is perceived more as a public relations industry-standard stunt than a sincere effort to address the issue.

Bad timing

What could possibly be worse than being associated with a transparency issue when the very country a company operates in is overshadowed by opaque operation and governance? While civil societiety is striving to push the government to be more transparent in disclosing documents linked to public companies and public funds, the atmosphere is filled with agony and frustration.

Maxis is unfortunate to fall into hot water on its alleged secret deal with disinterested customer at such a tense moment.

Growing frustration on the matter of opaque operations and governance is as dangerous as a ticking bomb. It can turn the course of a nation as proven by history in many places on earth and it is certainly capable of poisoning the integrity of a business.

Words of the Maxis CEO and head of consumer business

On April 8, 2016 in a live update on Facebook, Maxis CEO Morten Lundal publicly apologised for the tailored plans offered to different individuals.

“Recent market has moved on, focus on providing much more data. We have been preparing our own offerings, but we have taken too much time because we wanted to add more features than more data.

“While we are developing these new plans, some customers have tailored plans offered to them and these had angered some of you and it also doesn’t fit with our company’s commitment to fairness. So we were late in responding to you and we treated individual customers different. For that we are sorry.” said the CEO of Maxis.

The head of consumer business, Dushyanthan Vaithiyanathan, then announced that all existing One Plan customers will enjoy an automatic upgrade on their internet quota for the same price which will be made available later this month. Meanwhile, all One Plan customers will enjoy 3GB of free data, starting next week.