Over 400,000 Safaricom customers will be compensated following unfair charges billed on them when trying to retrieve the results of the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) exams released this week.

This follows an uproar that was raised by Safaricom users who complained they were being charged multiple times when they used shortcode 22252 designated to deliver the KCPE results.

In a statement, the giant telecommunication company noted that it was not directly involved in the transaction but a third party which it identified as Challa Communications.

"The 22252 shortcode is run by a third party named Challa Communications Limited, who are licensed by the Communications Authority and who was contracted by the Kenya National Examinations Council to provide the service,” the statement said.

The telcos stated that there was a technical hitch and instructed the firm to compensate all the affected customers today.

"On Wednesday Challa Communications informed us of a technical challenge that meant that customers who queried the system experienced delays in receiving results. This prompted some customers to repeat their query and in the process, with some billed multiple times for each attempt. As a result, a total of 424,011 were affected.

"We have instructed Challa Communications to refund all of the affected customers starting this afternoon, targeting those who queried the system more than once, as well as those who may have been billed without receiving any response," the presser indicated.

On Wednesday the KCPE results were released by Education Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang'i.