By Nwobodo Chidiebere
Consumers play a vital role in the economic system of a nation. Simply stated, consumers are individuals that buy products or services for personal use only, and not for manufacture or resale. Without consumers’ demand or patronage, producers would lack one of the key motivations to produce goods and services, which is to sell to consumers.
The consumer also forms a strategic part of the distribution chain in the overall economy. Succinctly put, he is the end of production cum distribution network, without whom there cannot be producers/service providers. Every buoyant economy rises and falls on the actions and reactions of the consumer.
Narrowing it down to telecommunications sector, especially as it affects Nigeria, the telecom consumer is one of the major determinants propelling the growth of the telecommunications industry. With a base of over 154 million subscribers, Nigerian consumers dominate the African telecommunications landscape. The consumers provide the revenues that Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) need to keep moving. Yet, they do not get the best satisfaction when it comes to services. In 2015, Nigerian telecom consumers coughed out a whopping $5.6 billion, which was spent on telecommunications services alone. In 2016, it was topped up by another $1 billion; making it a total of $6.6 billion.
After a long period of neglect and exploitation, finally, the Nigerian telecom consumers have gotten the required recognition from the telecommunications regulatory agency—the NCC. On 15th of March, 2017, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) historically declared the year 2017 as a year set aside to focus on the battles of Nigerian subscribers. The essence of the declaration is to highlight the plight of consumers, as regards the poor quality of services being rendered to them by Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), and proffer solutions to them. Unsolicited messages, illegal deductions from consumers’ credit, infuriating menace of robotic calls, poor quality of service, charges for unrequested services like caller tunes, call drops, unfriendly internet data plan packages, and so on, have become excruciating pains cum challenges to subscribers.
Declaration of 2017 as year of Nigerian Telecom Consumer will go a long way to restore the confidence of telecom subscribers in the ability of the Commission to protect their rights and privileges, which is in line with the mandate of the Consumer Affairs Bureau of the NCC, which is: “To ensure the protection of the rights, privileges and interests of telecommunications consumers, including the physically challenged groups through adequate information dissemination programmes; as well as effective policies and strategies that promote effective and qualitative telecoms service delivery.”
There is no doubt that some of the Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) have defaulted on their primary responsibility of providing qualitative telecommunications services to Nigerian consumers. Poor network coverage has remained a recurring decimal in the industry. Even when the NCC has provided Do-Not-Disturb (DND) code, to enable consumers control the menace of unsolicited messages, by sending it to 2442, it is yet to abate. Exorbitant charges for services not rendered or requested have become a piece of bone in the throat of telecom consumers. A pathetic situation where Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) impose unsolicited caller tunes on consumers, and still deduct money from them as fees for these tunes, leaves much to be desired. Inadequate telecom infrastructure, especially in the rural areas, has also contributed immensely to poor network coverage.
Apart from making complaints via NCC’s designated line of 622, telecom consumers on the street want a system put in place by the NCC that automatically reverses unjustifiable deductions made on their airtime, without having to embark on bureaucratic voyage of reporting to the Consumer Affairs Bureau of the NCC, or the Complaint Commission. The banking sector model, where Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) immediately reverse unpaid debt alerts, should be instituted in the telecommunications sector, as part of regulatory measures to protect telecom consumers.
Realistically, how many telecom consumers will start calling the NCC’s complaint line of 622 because their Network Operators shortchanged them of N50 for unsolicited caller tunes? How many telecom consumers will have the patience to keep dialling 622 anytime Network Operators cheat of them of N20? How many of the telecom consumers are observant or literate enough to know when they have been exploited? What will a telecom consumer do if, at the end of the month, he has not been able to exhaust his one-month data plan due to poor quality of internet services, and the hosting Network Operator insists that he recharges his data plan before the remaining data will be rolled over, or allowed to expire with the month? What stops the Network Service Providers from rolling over subscriptions to the next month, especially at any period there is epileptic internet service? These are thought provoking questions racing through the minds of telecom consumers. The Nigerian Telecom Consumer Year project has provided the desired opportunity to all the relevant stakeholders to sit down and iron out ways of addressing the issues, once and for all.
Few weeks ago, the NCC summoned the Mobile Network Operators to a meeting, where the Riot Act was read to them on the importance of improving quality of service. As much as I will commend the NCC for the bold step, I want to advocate something more self-sustaining than what is obtainable now. The NCC does not have to compel MNOs to maintain quality of service in the industry by imposing fines on them all the time, or mandating them to refund certain amounts to telecom consumers via airtime. There should be a system that automatically blocks unsolicited messages from reaching the consumer; without the subscriber sending codes to designated lines. The proposed electronic system should compensate telecom consumers, let’s say with airtime, anytime N50 is deducted for unrequested caller tunes. The system should automatically roll over data subscription plan any month that a particular Network Operators falls below 60 per cent performance, as regards provision of internet services.
Before Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) are crucified, I will do justice to them by highlighting some of the bottlenecks that have made improved quality of service a herculean task in the polity. The age-longed electricity crisis in the country has been one of the impediments affecting not only Quality of Service (QoS) but cost of operations incurred by the Mobile Network Operators (MNOs). Telecom infrastructure vandalism is a major setback, not only in the quest to improve quality of service but in total network coverage cum broadband penetration.
The current Mobile Termination Rate (MTR) of N3.90k/minute is in variance with economic realities on ground—and it is unsustainable. A review has already become inevitable in the industry in order to keep the MNOs above water. Cost of importing modem telecom equipment vis-à-vis exchange rate is strangulating MNOs. There is also the Right of Way (RoW) holdup erected by the State Governments, which has stood in the way of fibre optics roll out. NCC’s telecom consumers’ project has provided a good platform for both MNOs and telecom consumers to synergise in order to get better telecom services. One of the major achievements of this project is that it will afford telecom consumers the necessary feedback medium needed to address various telecom-related challenges.
Chidiebere writes from Abuja.
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