The Financial Services Tribunal (FST) has dismissed a reconsideration application by a former Clientèle Life call centre agent who “went off-script” when speaking to a customer who thought she was applying for a loan.
Clientèle Life’s case against Themba Mathebula hinged on a phone call on 17 September last year. He spoke with a client who had applied for a loan via the company’s “Super Compare” website. Mathebula told the client that “she has been selected to be assisted with money up to R100 000”. When pressed on the repayment terms, he replied: “As long as you are covered with us, as long as it is active, and it does not lapse.” However, he allegedly failed to “clearly” disclose that he was selling a funeral policy, not discussing a loan.
Clientèle Life accused Mathebula of dishonesty, claiming he “knowingly proceeded to capture and activate the [life insurer’s] Funeral Dignity Plan” without the client’s awareness of its nature. As a result, the client neither consented to the policy nor the subsequent debit from her account. She later cancelled the policy, citing “unethical selling”.
Following a debarment hearing on 17 October 2024 – which Mathebula did not attend – the chairperson upheld the FSP’s charges, debarring him on 22 October 2024.
In his reconsideration application, Mathebula expressed “shock” at the debarment, saying he learned of it only on 4 November 2024 because he never received the hearing notice. He attributed this to a mid-September 2024 mugging during which his phone was stolen. Having provided a new number to his manager, he argued that Clientèle if intended him to attend the debarment hearing, it should have contacted him on his new cellphone number.
On the substantive issue, Mathebula denied wrongdoing, insisting he followed the product script and did not “defraud the client”.
He claimed he informed the client that the call concerned a funeral policy and not a loan application, and the client gave her permission to have her bank account debited for the funeral policy.
Trained to follow the script
In response to the reconsideration application, Clientèle Life submitted a comprehensive record in January this year that outlined a pattern of misrepresentation and failure to adhere to company and regulatory standards.
Clientèle Life emphasised that Mathebula was well prepared for his role. His induction training included the Treating Customers Fairly framework, designed to ensure agents have the “product knowledge and systems knowledge” needed to serve clients responsibly. Agents are required to stick to the approved product script. Mathebula “achieved above-benchmark results in all assessments”, indicating that he knew what was required of him.
After training, he faced a “readiness assessment”, selling a policy to a quality assessor posing as a client, further testing his ability to follow the script.
Not the first incident
Clientèle Life provided a summary of the call transcript between Mathebula and the client.
The FSP said the transcript showed that Mathebula pitched a funeral policy but framed it as a loan. His mandate was strictly to sell insurance, not loans.
Clientèle Life said he “rushes the name of the policy”, making only the “money” aspect audible, steering the conversation towards a loan offer. By rushing the script and closing statement, he failed to adequately explain the product, leaving the client uninformed.
When she asked how long repayment would take, her confusion was evident, yet Mathebula didn’t clarify. Clientèle asserted: “It is unethical and unacceptable for the client to be tricked into having a funeral plan that was not honestly offered to them.”
This wasn’t Mathebula’s first misstep. A final written warning from 5 March 2024 documented a similar incident – selling a funeral policy as a loan. He was told to follow the script and provide clear information, responding with undertakings to “do the right thing next time” and “always follow the script”.
Yet, breaches persisted. Emails from 6 August and 30 September 2024 flagged additional failures to adhere to the script, each accompanied by advice on how to rectify the errors.
Client did not ask about the loan
After Clientèle Life filed its record with the FST, Mathebula augmented his grounds for reconsideration.
Mathebula acknowledged the incidents on 6 August and 30 September 2024, confirming that he attended two sessions with the compliance officer. In these sessions, agents were taught how to answer questions asked by clients and explicitly directed to avoid creating an impression that the loan application goes together with the Funeral Dignity Plan.
But he claimed he never received any readiness training on Clientèle Life’s “Super Compare Campaign” nor any induction training on the “Super Compare Client”.
Turning to the call itself, Mathebula insisted it was not rushed and was conducted at the “same pace” as all his other client calls. He further explained that he was instructed by Clientèle to answer only the questions asked by the client. The client did not enquire about a loan, so all his responses, including those about payment terms, pertained to the funeral policy, not the loan.
To bolster his case, Mathebula pointed to the language he used during the call, asserting he was clearly selling a funeral policy. He cited specific terms from the call summary, such as “Ultimate Funeral Dignity plan”, “cover”, “in the event of death”, and “beneficiary”, as evidence that his intent and communication were unambiguous.
Notice received, opportunity missed
Mathebula argued he never received the notice of intention to debar and only learned of his debarment after the fact. Therefore, he was denied an opportunity to defend himself.
The Tribunal said the record of the proceedings disproved this. The notice was emailed on 15 October 2024, with a read receipt showing Mathebula viewed it on 16 October 2024 at 10.18am – before the 17 October hearing. The final debarment notice followed on 23 October 2024, delivered at 4.03pm to the same undisputed email address. The Tribunal concluded: “There is therefore no basis on which to find that the applicant did not receive the notice of intention to debar prior to the debarment hearing”
It affirmed that Clientèle complied with section 14 of the FAIS Act by offering him an opportunity to respond.
Customer’s evident confusion was not addressed
Under section 13(2)(a)(i) of the FAIS Act, representatives must be competent and compliant, while section 3 of the General Code of Conduct demands services be rendered honestly, fairly, with due skill, care, and diligence, and in the interests of the client and the integrity of the financial services industry.
Section 3(1)(a) of the General Code requires that the information provided to clients must be “factually correct”, “in plain language, avoid uncertainty or confusion and not be misleading”. It must be adequate and appropriate in the context of the financial service, taking into account the factually established or reasonably assumed level of knowledge of the client.
The Tribunal said the call summary shows that Mathebula first asked the customer about her loan application and then told her that “she has been selected to be assisted with money up to R100 000”. He did mention the funeral policy, the cover amount, and asked the customer to nominate a beneficiary. But at no point did he make it clear that what was being offered was distinct from the loan application.
The Tribunal noted: “It also cannot be assumed that the customer has knowledge of these terms in the context of the financial service being offered.”
When the client asked about repayment terms and seemed surprised by the request to nominate a beneficiary, Mathebula did not allay the confusion by adequately conveying to the customer that there was no repayment term, because he was offering her a funeral policy, not a loan.
The Tribunal said Mathebula had been previously told that when contacting customers who had applied online for a loan, it must be made clear to the customer that what is on offer is not a loan but the funeral policy. After acknowledging this mistake and promising to “do the right thing”, he failed in his duty to convey factually correct information to a customer. This was despite it being apparent, based on the customer’s questions and responses during the call, that she was confused about the product being offered.
The Tribunal rejected Mathebula’s defence that he did not receive training on the “Super Compare Client”. It said the product was the same funeral policy he was trained to sell. He received adequate training, performed well in assessments, and had been explicitly instructed multiple times to distinguish the policy from a loan.
The Tribunal concluded that the facts supported Clientèle’s finding that Mathebula lacked honesty in rendering financial services and dismissed his application.
