The mobile number portability activities carried out by telecommunications operators in the country have declined by 53 per cent in the past two years.
The industry recorded a total of 14,491 incoming and outgoing porting activities in November this year, compared to 31,077 in November 2016, data obtained from the Nigerian Communications Commission have shown.
Mobile number portability was introduced by the NCC in 2013 to encourage competition and ensure that consumers continue to enjoy quality service on all the mobile networks.
However, in the past one month, analyses of the data from the NCC indicated that from October to November 2018, porting activities increased by 13 per cent.
In October 2018, the telecoms industry witnessed 12,840 incoming and outgoing porting activities.
The statistics showed that incoming porting activities in November were 6,964 while outgoing porting activities were 7,527.
On the outgoing table, 2,388 subscribers moved from MTN Nigeria to other networks through mobile number portability in November.
The NCC revealed that MTN subscribers dropped by 35 customers in November against 5,363 customers who deserted the network in July.
The NCC said 1,711 customers moved from Airtel Nigeria in November, while 1,869 subscribers deserted Globacom and 1,559 moved from 9mobile to other networks in the same month.
9mobile topped the incoming table as it gained 2,608 customers in November.
MTN Nigeria, Airtel Nigeria and Globacom came second, third and fourth, respectively, on the gainers’ list as they gained 2,173, 1,469 and 714 subscribers respectively.
Incoming or inward porting refers to the movement of subscribers from a service provider’s network to another service provider’s network.
Outgoing or outward porting means the movement of subscribers to a service provider’s network from another provider’s network.
Meanwhile, findings showed that Nigerians preferred to own more than one SIM card instead of porting to another network.
The President, National Association of Telecoms Subscribers, Adeolu Ogunbanjo, who spoke on the issue, described mobile number portability as a crucial service in the telecoms industry, irrespective of the frequency of utilisation by subscribers.
He said, “Porting occurs when a subscriber is dissatisfied with a particular network or when a person is relocating to another place. Someone may be using a particular network that has good signal strength in a particular location, but may not get a good signal in a new location.
“Subscribers should report to the NCC if they are denied the opportunity to port. Some network operators do not like people porting, as such, they will ensure they frustrate them.”
Speaking on factors that could be responsible for the reduced interest in porting, the President, Association of Telecommunication Companies of Nigeria, Olusola Teniola, stated that many subscribers had discovered that the tariffs and quality of service on various networks were similar.
He said, “The issue is that a lot of users are finding out that the quality of service of network providers is not so different; the pricing is also not very different.”
“They either stay or get another number. It is no longer about me taking one number from one network to another, I keep that number and purchase a new number from another network and try it out.”
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