admin
THE promulgation by Government of regulations setting minimum quality of service and customer care in the telecommunications and related industries should go a long way in giving consumers their money’s worth.
As indicated in The Herald Business edition yesterday, Government has set minimum quality of service regulations for telecoms, internet, postal and data service providers. The new quality and customer care rules are contained in recently gazetted Statutory Instrument 42 of 2016 and are termed Postal and Telecommunications (Quality of Service) Regulations.
Dropped calls, slow internet connectivity, high service costs and unavailability of network have for a long time been used by service providers to siphon money from subscribers yet the benefits between operators and consumers should be mutual.
But now, if a particular service provider fails to meet the new prescribed minimum quality of service, the culprit will be required to account for the shoddy service and where possible, to reimburse consumers who have been short-changed.
Strict follow through on requirements set out in these provisions should ensure that a service provider of a paid-for service stay on the wheel or face the music.
Many users of telecommunication and related services whose minimum quality standards will be regulated by Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe will agree the law was overdue.
Among the new minimum quality of service standards now expected of the service providers will be a call completion rate of 80 percent, which will result in mobile phone network operators being penalised for failure to meet the minimum standard.
Mobile telephone network service operators are also now required to ensure 99,99 percent service availability, service activation period of under five seconds, downtime of below 1 hour, interconnection gateway route down and repair time of less than an hour.
Further, the rules will require service providers to ensure network connectivity success rate equal or above 95 percent, call set up success rate to a valid number, dialled at any given time, to be above 95 percent. The call completion rate, the percentage of calls that are successfully set up, maintained and terminated normally by the calling or called party, should be equal or exceed 80 percent while the rate of dropped voice calls should be restricted within 2 percent.
Similar stringent measures to ensure high quality of service in the other areas of data, internet and postal services should, no doubt, fairly reward consumers who part with their hard earned cash for such services.
The other good thing about the new provisions is that consumers now have a benchmark to which they can hold the service providers, keep them on their feet and when need be, take legal action against operators who disregard the rules.
In the past it was difficult for subscribers and other customers to pin down service providers. There was no formal measurement or benchmark against which to demand certain quality of service. We were all at the mercy of service providers.
Regulating minimum quality of service is critical to help customers make informed decisions, verify claims by operators on service level or quality, understand the market, maintain or improve quality in absence or presence of competition, ensure fair competition and high quality for paid services.
What we are not sure of though is whether the Ministry and POTRAZ have effective monitoring mechanisms to ensure or measure compliance? What monitoring systems have been put in place and are they adequate? These are some of the questions customers have about the new rules.
The measurements should be important to customers, practical for operators and comparable between operators. Experts in the telecoms industry contend that regulatory authorities should concentrate on few important aspects of services.
However, in terms of SI 42 of 2016, part of the criteria to be used to measure compliance will be regular surveys that will be conducted by POTRAZ on consumers.
The licensee providing postal, courier, cellular telecommunication, public fixed telephony, data or internet service shall comply with the consumer care parameters provided in the sixth schedule to the regulations for consumer perception.
Consumer perception shall be measured through consumer surveys conducted by POTRAZ to assess level of compliance by licensees with the parameters set out in these regulations.
The authority shall process and generate individual and/ or comparative quality of service performance reports for the postal, courier, public fixed telephone and cellular telecommunication licensees.
The authority shall periodically publish the quality of service performance reports, including the consumer survey reports to promote consumer interests and competition in the sector.
It is our fervent hope and indeed that of consumers of the listed services that the regulations will bring relief with regard to the abuse many of them have often suffered at the hands of service providers in the absence of clear framework for recourse.
Online Reporter