Where is the NCC in these poor GSM services?

Since the advent of the Global System for Mobile (GSM) communication founded in 1991 but reached the Nigerian market in August 2001, the account of its 22-year-old services in the country has never been as glowing as they are in climes where things work including some developing countries of Africa. Yes, GSM radically transformed not just global economy but the whole of the modern way of life introduced by the 17th century scientific revolution. Sadly, the Nigerian experience of that same digital transformation of human activities is full of inexcusable frustrations supposedly arising from weak or poor connections by the inefficiency of service providers.

The experience of most or many subscribers in Nigeria has been grossly poor across the four major networks (MTN, Glo, Etisalat, and Airtel) in recent weeks. It has since become normal for calls to get through only after several failed attempts. When a subscriber finally gets his call through, he is  most often bound to spend, at least, the first dozen seconds of his call saying “hello” to the receiver of his call as if it were a half-duplex communication system or what people ordinarily refer to as “over-over” of the colonial days. It reminds me of the much time spent on the “over-over” in those days by the DS (as administrative heads of divisions were called at that time) and our Emir in their attempt to reach Sokoto to inform Sultan Abubakar III that the moon for the commencement or end of Ramadan had been sighted.

When one is not lucky to get his call through, the network would keep giving the subscriber automated excuses to explain why the call is not getting through. When a phone is switched off, it is normal to hear the automated voice say, “The number you’re trying to call is not available at the moment. Please, try again later.” But what many Nigerians cannot understand is when the automated voice keeps saying that which is not true of the subscriber they are trying to call. For example, the automated voice would say, “The number you’re trying to call is currently switched off” even when the phone of the subscriber being called were on.

Depending on the network one subscribed to, other odd messages from the automated responses, which are not true of the real situations but rather of poor services include, “Dear customer, your call can not be completed at the moment. Please, try again later”; “Your call is being forwarded”; “The number you are trying to call does not exist”; “The number you are trying to call is invalid”; “The user you are trying to call is out of coverage area”; and “The called number does not have the facility to receive calls. Please, call the customer care for more information.”

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Aside of these, there is also another dimension to the set of frustrations faced by GSM subscribers in Nigeria. As soon as a call gets through, for example, some kind of noise that sounds as if it were ‘water boiling on top of a cooker’ would just ensue. It would be so disturbingly earsplitting that one is sometimes compelled to abort the call. The diversion of a subscriber’s call to an unintended receiver is another embarrassing experience that usually forces subscribers to apologize over an error caused by very poor quality of service; a responsibility that is entirely that of the service providers.

Of all the frustrations being suffered by subscribers, I find two most upsetting if not humiliating. While a caller’s attempt at calling someone would clearly show that it is not connecting to the receiver’s number, it would (unknowingly to the caller) be displaying caller’s number on the receiver’s screen as if the former were ‘flashing’ the latter. I find this most ridiculous. The other ludicrous embarrassment being endured by subscribers is call-dropping, which refers to a subscriber’s conversation being suddenly cut off before it is consciously terminated by either the caller or the receiver. This happens most times in the middle of calls, and unpredictably during critical conversations.

These days, failed delivery of text messages has become another source of concern particularly for subscribers who, by nature of their jobs, resort to SMS. Others prefer it because it is cheaper. Today, text messages are never delivered to recipients. Where they deliver, it is done  belatedly; after several hours or even days. Are we sure failed delivery of SMS has not threatened matrimonial peace in some homes or the success of some business ventures or some other costly regrets? These issues cannot be easily wished away.

Carrying out online banking transactions using a mobile banking application is now a task as huge as climbing the Zuma rock at the border of Niger State with the FCT in Suleja. Even the online purchase of credit could at times be more time wasting than going to a road-side vendor to buy it. We could, as laypersons in communication technology, attribute all these network glitches to weak signal strength. Most of the challenges faced by Nigerians when they want to pay bills or carry out other transactions on their mobile phones, or even in the banks, are linked to poor GSM services because each require the use of data which efficiency depends on GSM networks.

If the service providers think subscribers have no right to benefit from the money they spend on airtime and data, the regulatory agency, mainly the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), should be seen to be forthcoming in ensuring that subscribers have value for their money. In climes where policies work, service providers apologize to subscribers even if the glitches experienced were for one hour. They do that by sending SMS to subscribers and through advertorials in the print media. Where the poor service is for a prolonged period, subscribers are reimbursed with airtime or data to cover part of the losses suffered during period(s) of network failures. Here in Nigeria, it is dead silence from the service providers as if all is well with their services.

If the NCC is failing in its mandate, subscribers expect the the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) to, as defined by the Act establishing it, address consumers’ complaints and safeguard the interest of consumers. But like the NCC, the FCCPC too is lost in the wind of compromise. In the given circumstance, who takes care of the interest of Nigerian telecom subscribers? May Allah touch the hearts of NCC authorities to compel telecom operators to improve upon their services, amin.