Posts tagged portability
MTNL has lost 10355 users from number portability
Feb 23rd
State-run telecom company Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd. lost 10,355 users since the launch of mobile number portability, or MNP, junior Telecom Minister Sachin Pilot said Wednesday.
But MTNL gained 4,486 new users from other telecom companies through MNP, a service that allows mobile phone users to switch their service providers without changing their numbers, Pilot told lawmakers in the lower house of the parliament.
MNP service was launched on Nov. 25 in the northern Indian state of Haryana, and subsequently extended it across the country on Jan. 20. MTNL provides communications services only in the Delhi and Mumbai service areas.State-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd. lost 223,824 users to other mobile phone companies post the launch of MNP, and gained 92,243 new users from others, Pilot said.
BSNL offers services in the remaining of 20 of India’s 22 telecom service areas.
“The main reasons for porting out [switching from] have been reported to be network/coverage issues, tariff issues…,” the minister said.
Pilot said that BSNL has waived off an INR19 fee for users opting to change their service provider to the company, formed special cells to address user grievances, introduced competitive tariff plans, and also has given additional incentives for its distributors and retailers selling its services.
MTNL has also waived off the fee for users in Mumbai, introduced competitive tariffs and improved its mobile phone network coverage and capacity to retain old users and add new subscribers, the minister said.
From www.totaltele.com
Google Voice, number portability: How to teach your old phone number new tricks.
Jan 26th
There are few technologies that I’ve promoted as relentlessly as Google Voice. In several columns and in a video, I’ve lauded the service for transforming how I use my phone. Instead of having one number for your home phone, another for your office, and another for your mobile, Voice gives you a single phone number for everything. When someone calls me, the service rings all my phones (or any subset of phones, depending on a schedule I’ve set). Plus, you can even answer your phone in Gmail (which is really handy when you’re in a place with bad cell coverage but great Internet coverage).
But that’s not all! Voice transcribes my phone messages and e-mails me the text, freeing me from the scourge of voice mail. Even though these transcriptions are often hilariously inaccurate, it lets me get the gist of my calls in an instant. It also lets me respond to text messages from my computer, which is much easier than fumbling on a phone. And, finally, because the service offers free calls across the country and cheap calls overseas, it has breathed new life into my home phone, which mobile phones had long ago promised to kill off. Best of all, Google Voice is free.
Yet despite my fevered proselytizing, I’d be surprised if I’ve convinced all that many people to use Voice. For many years, Google Voice were open only by invitation. The service also took some time to add key features—like text messaging—and it’s gone through a few buggy periods. (The site was unbelievably slow just after the Google acquisition.) But the biggest shortcoming, by far, has been Voice’s lack of number portability. When you signed up, you had to pick a new Voice-enabled phone number. Since most of the service’s features only work when people call your Voice number directly, that meant you had to give all your friends and work contacts new digits. For most people, this was a nonstarter.
On Tuesday, Google fixed that lingering problem. If you pay Google $20, you can sign up for Voice with your existing mobile phone number. (You can find step-by-step instructions here.) Once you convert your cell number to a Voice number, it will get all the Google superpowers you’ve been missing, including voice-mail transcription and the ability to ring all your phones simultaneously. The catch is that the Voice conversion will require you to call up your cell provider, and if you aren’t careful, it may end up costing you an early termination fee. If you’re willing to put up with a string of potentially maddening interactions with customer-service reps, then I’d highly recommend making the switch to Voice immediately.
To see why porting your number to Google Voice could be an annoying process, you need to understand how the system works. Think of it as something like an old-timey phone operator. When someone calls your Voice number, Google routes the call through the Internet to your multiple phones. In order for you to receive calls, you need to have a service plan for each of your phones—that is, you still need a cell provider, and if you want to get calls at home, you’ll still need to pay for a landline.
That’s the complication in porting your mobile phone number to Voice. If you assign the number to Google without telling your mobile provider, then Verizon or AT&T will think you’re canceling your plan. If you’re under a contract, the phone company is going to charge you a fee for canceling early. Those fees can run into the hundreds of dollars depending on what kind of phone plan you have and how much time remains on your contract. (Verizon’s fee for smartphones is $350, and AT&T’s is $325.)
From www.slate.com
Google Voice Number Portability May Not Spur Adoption
Jan 26th
Google Voice Number Portability May Not Spur Adoption
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By: Clint Boulton
2011-01-25
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Google Voice users will have the option to port their mobile phone number in the coming weeks. The service costs $20 for U.S. users only, but will it boost adoption of the service?
From www.eweek.com
Google Voice to Offer Number Portability for $20
Jan 20th
Google is testing a number portability for its Google Voice application that will let users use their personal mobile phone numbers as the digits through which to route all of their calls for $20.
Google Voice is a phone management application that lets any user route all of their landline, work and mobile calls through one special number and mailbox, accessible through the Web via Google’s cloud computing infrastructure.
More than 1 million people use the free service, which launched to the entire U.S. in June. Google Voice provides some neat perks such as call management and archiving, automatic voice mail message transcription, SMS support, conference calling, and low-cost international calling.
But assigning each user a special number seems onerous for Google and for the user. To wit, Engadget found that some Google Voice users are seeing a “change/port” option under their phone settings in Google Voice.
For $20, users will be able to move their person mobile phone numbers — not landlines or corporate mobile numbers — to Google Voice, just a if they were switching it from, say, AT&T to Verizon Wireless.
However, the port will also terminate users’ current service plan with U.S. This likely means carriers will charge users early termination fees into the hundreds of dollars. GigaOm has more on this.
A Google spokesperson confirmed the portability test:
“We’re continually testing new features to enhance the user experience. For a limited amount of time, we’re making the Google Voice number porting process available to users. We don’t have any additional details to share at this time, but plan to offer this feature to all users in the near future.”
What Google is allowing with this feature is essentially calling in the cloud — the ability to allow one number to free associate among multiple devices rather than be strapped to a single desk phone or handset.
It’s a potentially disruptive force that carriers cannot like at all. Google already tried to disrupt the current carrier model by selling the Nexus One over the Web only.
It will be interesting to see whether many people, beside the cloud aficionados, embrace Google’s cloud calling model.
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From www.eweek.com
Mobile number portability will improve quality of service
Nov 29th
Bangalore: In the early 1970s when my father got married, among the pieces of advice he received from his uncle, he recalls one the most: “Young man, now that you are married, have you booked a phone for yourself?” My father answered in the negative as he had heard that getting a phone connection meant a long 10-year wait and ‘sifarish’ (recommendation).
This aversion to booking a phone connection was further reinforced by the then communications minister C.M. Stephen’s statement in the parliament a few years later: Those unhappy with the service are welcome to return the phone connection as we have several lakhs waiting in the queue for a phone.
This week when Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and the union Communications Minister Kapil Sibal launched mobile number portability (MNP) at Rohtak, a small town neighbouring India’s capital, it signaled a sea change brought about by the mobile revolution. The telecom industry watchdog, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), has been pushing the telecom operators, including the government-run firms, to focus on quality of service (QoS).
MNP, that allows subscribers to retain their mobile number even after changing service providers, will undoubtedly improve the QoS. In just 16 years, after mobile phone services were launched in India, the growth of new mobile connections has been setting a new record every month.
India has become the fastest growing mobile industry with around 15 million new connections every month. Nationally, every other Indian has a mobile connection. The metro mobile tele-density is four times higher than the rural mobile tele-density The intense competition for new customers has led to a price war resulting in a phone call costing less than a paisa per second. More aggressive players like Tata DoCoMo, who initially drew blood by offering one paisa per second local calls, extended this tariff for a few STD and ISD calls.
Customers, initially elated with declining tariff plans, did not realize that the pressure for margins would lead to difficulties like poor voice quality, frequent call drops or no-signal zones even in the densely populated metros. The sudden spurt in the number of mobile subscribers – from 76 million in December 2005 to over 670 million today – too accentuated issues like poor customer care and inappropriate tariff plans. To be fair to the operators, the race for new additions led to lower margins.
In order to shore up their bottom lines in a scarce spectrum environment, customer service levels and the overall customer experience dropped. For the service providers to improve QoS there is an urgent need to grow the current less-than-$4 a month average revenue per user (ARPU) by offering a bouquet of value-added services. The current ARPU levels threaten the long term survival of most new entrants, especially as they look to the hinterland for growth.
Service providers have had to make substantial investment in network, technology, processes to allow mobile subscribers to switch network. In fact, Idea Cellular has taken the lead in spreading awareness about MNP through a television campaign. The advantage of MNP will be the flexibility to retain the mobile number and an improved QoS.
The biggest churn is expected to come from the ‘high ARPU paying post-paid customers’ accounting for about 5 percent of the total mobile users. Current industry estimates suggest that between 5 and 8 percent of the post paid customers may switch to another service provider. According to IT intelligence firm, IDC India, two of every five mobile handsets sold in the country were multi SIM handsets, indicating that a significant number of Indian users are familiar with issues of quality of more than one service provider.
The service providers suffer the wrath of customers as a result of customer service issues – deactivation of imported phone without IMEI numbers and disconnection due to incomplete verification. These irate customers may look at alternate service providers using MNP.
Mobile number portability will improve quality of service
Nov 28th
In the early 1970s when my father got married, among the pieces of advice he received from his uncle, he recalls one the most: “Young man, now that you are married, have you booked a phone for yourself?” My father answered in the negative as he had heard that getting a phone connection meant a long 10-year wait and ‘sifarish’ (recommendation).
This aversion to booking a phone connection was further reinforced by the then communications minister C.M. Stephen’s statement in the parliament a few years later: Those unhappy with the service are welcome to return the phone connection as we have several lakhs waiting in the queue for a phone.
This week when Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and the union Communications Minister Kapil Sibal launched mobile number portability (MNP) at Rohtak, a small town neighbouring India’s capital, it signaled a sea change brought about by the mobile revolution. The telecom industry watchdog, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), has been pushing the telecom operators, including the government-run firms, to focus on quality of service (QoS).
MNP, that allows subscribers to retain their mobile number even after changing service providers, will undoubtedly improve the QoS. In just 16 years, after mobile phone services were launched in India, the growth of new mobile connections has been setting a new record every month.
India has become the fastest growing mobile industry with around 15 million new connections every month. Nationally, every other Indian has a mobile connection. The metro mobile tele-density is four times higher than the rural mobile tele-density The intense competition for new customers has led to a price war resulting in a phone call costing less than a paisa per second. More aggressive players like Tata DoCoMo, who initially drew blood by offering one paisa per second local calls, extended this tariff for a few STD and ISD calls.
Customers, initially elated with declining tariff plans, did not realize that the pressure for margins would lead to difficulties like poor voice quality, frequent call drops or no-signal zones even in the densely populated metros. The sudden spurt in the number of mobile subscribers – from 76 million in December 2005 to over 670 million today – too accentuated issues like poor customer care and inappropriate tariff plans. To be fair to the operators, the race for new additions led to lower margins.
In order to shore up their bottom lines in a scarce spectrum environment, customer service levels and the overall customer experience dropped. For the service providers to improve QoS there is an urgent need to grow the current less-than-$4 a month average revenue per user (ARPU) by offering a bouquet of value-added services. The current ARPU levels threaten the long term survival of most new entrants, especially as they look to the hinterland for growth.
Service providers have had to make substantial investment in network, technology, processes to allow mobile subscribers to switch network. In fact, Idea Cellular has taken the lead in spreading awareness about MNP through a television campaign. The advantage of MNP will be the flexibility to retain the mobile number and an improved QoS.
The biggest churn is expected to come from the ‘high ARPU paying post-paid customers’ accounting for about 5 percent of the total mobile users. Current industry estimates suggest that between 5 and 8 percent of the post paid customers may switch to another service provider. According to IT intelligence firm, IDC India, two of every five mobile handsets sold in the country were multi SIM handsets, indicating that a significant number of Indian users are familiar with issues of quality of more than one service provider.
The service providers suffer the wrath of customers as a result of customer service issues – deactivation of imported phone without IMEI numbers and disconnection due to incomplete verification. These irate customers may look at alternate service providers using MNP.
Meanwhile, the planned launch of 3G services by several mobile service providers and the subsequent increase in spectrum will enable service providers to offer better voice quality, lower dropped calls and improved network coverage. It will serve as a bonanza for mobile users, especially those who subscribe to 3G.
For the first time, the Indian smart phones and data cards users will be able to enjoy a superior user experience and record better download speeds. While MNP assures customers the freedom to choose service providers, an improvement in the QoS alone will help the mobile customers stay loyal to their service provider.
If customer acquisition was the only goal for service providers until recently, MNP will surely drive them to look at the QoS seriously. And the mobile users can talk easy!
