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- Stay-at-home mum tries to buy mobile phone
- Vodafone refuses, says she needs real job
- It's like a return to the 50s, she says
STAFF at a major telco company refused to sell a mobile phone to a stay-at-home mum because she didn't have a real job.
Lyndal Fair, 36, a mother of three, said she was shocked and embarrassed when staff at a Vodafone store told her they didn't sell phones to full-time mums.
Staff instead suggested she ask her husband to buy the phone for her under his own name.
"I really felt like a second-class citizen for the first time since becoming a mum," Ms Fair said. "I couldn't believe it. It was like being back in the '50s.
"For anyone to suggest that being a mum isn't a real job is just ridiculous. I thought we'd gone past this sort of outdated way of thinking. Obviously the message hasn't got through at Vodafone."
Ms Fair is a full-time homemaker for husband Michael and their three children - Hannah, 8, Nicholas, 6, and Gabrielle, 3.
She was lucky to be able to stay home to care for their children because Mr Fair earned a good wage as an industrial electrician.
"Being a mum is a full-time job and it's a very hard job - the hardest job you can have - because if you get it wrong, the ramifications for everyone are enormous," Ms Fair said.
She tried to buy the mobile phone on Monday at a Vodafone shop in Geelong's Bay City Plaza.
"They asked for my details - my home number, my work number - and I told them I don't have a separate work number because I'm a mum. That's when she said 'We have a problem'," Ms Fair said.
Staff told her it was a regular occurrence and they had sent away another mum empty-handed only days before.
"They said their computers just don't allow it," she said.
"It's just terrible. You cop it as a mum if you work because you're not at home with your children, and if you do stay home you get hit with nonsense like this."
Ms Fair said she was also angry because the phone she wanted - a BlackBerry Storm - was available only through Vodafone.
Her husband also blasted the telco.
"It's a bit rude. I can assure them, my wife does have a real job and she works very hard. It's very disappointing that they're treating any woman like this," Mr Fair said.
Vodafone spokesman Greg Spears yesterday confirmed the no-housewives rule and said getting a man to buy the phone instead was the quickest fix.
The policy was meant to stop people signing up for phones they couldn't afford and unfortunately didn't take into account that many stay-at-home mums weren't short of cash.
"It's not an ideal situation. We're trying to fix it," Mr Spears said.
Eva Cox, of the Women's Electoral Lobby, said the company should be ashamed. She called on women to boycott Vodafone until it changed the policy.
"They need to be careful that Vodafone don't get a black ban after this, or a pink ban, if you want to call it that," Ms Cox said.
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