Mobile phone users angry with telcos for poor services
From Accra through Sunyani to Tamale, mobile phone users have raised issues with the poor services rendered by telecommunication companies (telcos) in the country. The poor services, characterised by call drops, call breaks, network congestion and Internet interruptions, have compelled some users to subscribe to more than one network.
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Even though the complaints are nothing new, what has aggravated public anger is the fact that penalties imposed by the National Communications Authority (NCA), do not seem to have any impact on quality of service.
In May, this year, five telcos — MTN, tiGO, Glo, Airtel and Expresso — out of the six telecom operators in Ghana were slapped with fines of GH¢900,000 for providing poor services for their consumers.
While industry players maintain that challenges confronting the telecom industry, including the breaking of cables by contractors, stealing of cables, frequent power outages and high fees charged by landowners, account for the problems, that excuse does not appear to sit well with mobile phone users, as they call for stiffer punishment for telecom operators who flout the regulations, reports Seth J. Bokpe.
According to the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications (GCT), the total official count for cable cuts for 2012 alone was 1,605, a number which was more than three times the number of recorded cuts in 2011.
Records kept by operators show that 75 per cent of the cuts happened during road construction, while the remaining were due to thefts of the copper used for the cables.
In January, this year, alone, one network operator was said to have reported some 85 cable cuts which cost more than GH¢17,000 to repair each time.
Some of the cables were said to have been destroyed in the course of illegal mining activities, while others were destroyed by bush fires.
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The staggering figures notwithstanding, consumers say the operators are not doing enough to tackle the poor quality of service.
CEO of GCT
When the Chief Executive Officer of the GCT, Mr Kwaku Sakyi-Addo, was contacted in Accra, he declined to comment on the matter.
But in an interview with the Daily Graphic in March, this year, he said factors causing the challenges, such as drop calls and call set-up time across networks, were a function of the social and economic environment.
He said cable cuts, thefts and bottlenecks in rolling out telecommunication infrastructure all contributed to the poor service.
He added that critical sites planned to provide capacity and coverage in identified areas had not been built due to acquisition and community agitation problems.
Mr Sakyi-Addo said all needed to understand that it was only when telecom infrastructure was built that quality of service would improve in communities because it was the infrastructure that carried the service.
When the number portability system came into effect in July, last year, the expectation of many subscribers was that their freedom of choice in moving from one network to another, without losing their numbers, would redefine competition and improve services.
The new service was expected to impose cutting-edge responsibility on the operators who would now ensure that the quality of their service was good enough to retain the confidence of their subscribers.
But that hope appears to be fading, with some subscribers accusing the telcos of being more interested in advertising than improving the quality of service.
The history of telecom
In the 1990s, communication centres came into vogue to expand the frontiers of telecommunication. Smart entrepreneurs constructed kiosks or hired shops to establish what became one of the most vibrant businesses in the country.
Computers, fax machines and other gadgets were added to provide secretarial services.
It was a privilege to own a mobile phone when it was introduced in the 1990s by Millicom under the operator name, Mobitel, with handsets nicknamed then as 'timber'.
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Those who were privileged to own handsets then carried them like badges of honour, as the handsets, somehow, symbolised affluence.
Even with the entry of Millicom later, the telecom sector remained under regulation. The state operator at the time, Ghana Telecom (GT), was restricted to landline operation. It was not allowed to operate mobile phone services until Spacefon, which later metamorphosed into Areeba before becoming MTN, entered the market.
Then in 1997, the process of deregulation of the telecom sector began and GT received the licence to operate the Onetouch mobile service.
Celtel, which later became Kasapa before becoming Expresso, was also born.
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But even with three operators on the scene, the space was not big enough to allow as many people who wished to own mobile phones. At a time when a SIM card, which now sells for GH¢1, went for GH¢20 or 200,000 cedis, people had to queue for days to purchase a SIM card.
The expansion of the economy opened the sector with the entry of Zain (now Airtel), which took over the assets of Westel, and now Glo.
Mobile telephony in Ghana has not been limited to only the networks.
The sale of mobile phone handsets has become a lucrative business. Today, different brands of handsets are available on the market. Some brands upgrade their models within short periods.
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To be trendy, some users change their handsets as and when new models are introduced.
Just as mobile phone manufacturing companies improve their craft, so does the local telecom industry invest in infrastructure to improve service.
There have been evolution in the networks from 2Gs, 3Gs to 3.5Gs to improve services.
Having captured the voice market, all operators have turned to data by introducing broadband services through modems and Wifi to facilitate Internet use by subscribers.
However, with the huge investment in the telecom sector which has been touted by operators and applauded by the government, the question on the lips of many is, why is this not reflecting in the quality of services provided?
Market share
Voice
The total cellular/mobile voice subscriber base in Ghana as of April, 2013 was 26,591,124. MTN’s market share was 12,039,527, representing 45.3 per cent.
Vodafone’s market share then was 5,672,287, which gave it 21.3 per cent, while tiGO, with 14 per cent of the market share, had 3,721,722 subscribers.
Controlling 12.6 per cent of the market, 
Airtel had 3,346,543 subscribers, and Glo’s share of the industry was 6.2 per cent, with 1,654,324 customers.
Expresso was at the bottom of the telecom business ladder with 156,721 subscribers, representing 0.6 per cent of the market.
Data
The number of data subscribers in the country by April, 2013 had decreased to 8,696,434 from 8,895,430 in March, 2013. While MTN’s market share was 5,820,168 subscribers, tiGO followed with 1,144,850 subscribers.
Airtel had 843,899 subscribers, while Vodafone provided Internet services for 611,367 subscribers.
Glo and Expresso were in the competition with 229,058 and 47,092 subscribers, respectively.
Mobile number portability data
A total of 105,678 mobile phone subscribers in Ghana took advantage of the mobile number portability (MNP) to move from one mobile service provider to another while retaining their mobile number in September, 2011.
After the expiration of their 30-day mandatory waiting period, 2,477 subscribers elected to port back to their previous service providers, while 303 subscribers ported to a third network during that period.
The booming telecom sector also brought with it challenges and customers are not keeping quiet.
Users’ concern
The figures mean that in voice services, the country has attained more than 100 per cent coverage of the population, since Ghana’s population stands at 25 million.
Some consumers are reading meaning into the figures.
For Alvin Johnson, an office assistant, MTN lines are always congested because they have the largest customer base in Ghana, reports Mary Ampeh in Accra.
“Their hotline is so annoying to use. When you know you can’t walk into any MTN customer care office and you decide to call its hotline to have a problem fixed for you, you can wait for more than 30 minutes before a customer care agent picks your call,” he said.
For Samuel Bryan Buabeng, a politician, there were varied reasons for which he switched from one network to another in search of what he described as “elusive quality service”.
According to him, tiGO charged exorbitant fees for its Internet services; Glo had the fastest Internet service, while MTN was not stable in the provision of quality services.
Some mobile phone users in the Cape Coast municipality say the network providers should be sanctioned for the extremely poor services they provide customers, writes Shirley Asiedu-Addo from Cape Coast.
They indicated that sometimes the phone recharge cards they bought got wasted because of the poor network system.
Others also complained about some Internet services, saying many of the services were regularly interrupted.
However, it is not all customers who are taking the telcos to the cleaners.
tiGO seems to have received some commendation from its users.
Ms Alice Mortsi, a tiGO subscriber, said its services were the best and uninterrupted.
"I use only tiGO because it has been very reliable. The others have unreliable services and so I won't try them,” she said.
From Tamale, Vincent Amenuveve reports that there are mixed feelings among some mobile phone users in the Tamale metropolis regarding the quality of service by their respective service providers.
The users were not able to point out which service providers were on top of their services, as they claimed all the networks had their respective strengths and weaknesses.
In separate interviews, they indicated that because of the seemingly poor quality of service by the telcos, subscribers were compelled to subscribe to more than one network.
A reporter with the Ghana News Agency, Mr Yaw Ansah, said he used both MTN and Vodafone.
According to him, Vodafone’s data service was poor, while MTN’s was better but expensive.
For Internet services, he observed that MTN’s were faster but not consistent, while Vodafone’s were consistent but slow.
"On MTN I frequently experience call drops than Vodafone, making Vodafone better in that regard," Mr Ansah claimed.
On international calls, he said the charges by both MTN, and Vodafone using the roaming service were expensive.
A number of people interviewed on the delivery of telecommunication services in the country expressed some reservations about the quality of services and called for concerted efforts to eliminate the problems, reports Tim Dzamboe from Ho.
The problems identified by the subscribers ranged from inconsistency in delivery or sending of calls and messages, fluctuations, interference to unreliability of certain networks.
Mr Gameli Ahorlu said network fluctuations cut across, adding that even calls from the United States were sometimes misrepresented by false identification numbers.
Mr Constance Yao Agbley complained about noisy, buzzy and unclear backgrounds.
From Sunyani, Akwasi Ampratwum Mensah reports that a number of residents of the Sunyani municipality expressed disappointment at the services of the telcos.
They contended that network services had been poor in the previous years but were poorer nowadays, in spite of the huge profits that the telcos were making.
Mr Denis Kwadwo Peprah of Abesim said the companies continued to increase their network services without making any effort to improve the quality of services.
For him, it was time individuals and groups initiated court actions against the operators, so that they would find better ways to improve their services.
From Koforidua, Nana Konadu Agyeman reports that a number of residents of the town have mixed reactions to the quality of services being provided by the telcos. While some of the people were satisfied with the services rendered, others were unhappy.
“I have used Vodafone for the past nine years and I consider that network one of the most reliable,” Mr David Kissi, the Deputy Registrar in charge of Academic Affairs at the All Nations University College, said.
Kate Achibong, a Nigerian student, was of the view that MTN call charges were quite expensive and that the company had failed to render quality services both in Ghana and Nigeria.
Solution
The challenges facing the telecom sector are basically infrastructure. Service quality can only be guaranteed if there is a solid infrastructure base. Ideally, fibre cuts and cable thefts should not be a problem for the sector.
However, some people appear to be sabotaging the efforts of the telcos.
That notwithstanding, the operators need to sit up and put in place mechanisms to safeguard their infrastructure.
The NCA also needs to crack the whip and ensure that subscribers get their money’s worth.
There must be incentives for players in the telecommunication sector to urge them on to deliver quality services.
Punitive measures may be good, but of what use can they be if quality service is always sacrificed?