But seriously MTN had better bend over backwards to rectify deteriorating service quality or else; they might want to prod themselves to the fact that owning a chip from a rival network costs only GH¢ 1.
This is my second write-up on the company’s dwindling service quality but only God knows how many times myself and several thousand other aggrieved subscribers have had to lash out at MTN in our serene privacy or to family and associates.
My first article had to do with the way and manner in which MTN switched their call rates from the percentage zone to a monetary zone; a system which I still maintain till today inures more to their burgeoning economic ends.
My grave concerns this time round is to do with some persistent ills still being perpetrated on the part of the MTN setup and for which Oga Ikpoti and his yello squad had better find remedies to, exactly because of the above title.
For as huge a multinational as MTN, customer care and satisfaction which they tout as part of their core values in their numerous adverts all over the media, – print and electronic, is virtually absent.
Like the MTN Offices specifically at the Naa Densua Plaza at Achimota and the Aketeyman branches, the MTN system is almost always down and to reiterate a point from my first piece, the staff one encounters are almost always full of themselves.
At least having observed keenly the trend of mobile phone evolution since the days of mobitel till date, telecom companies across the spectrum have gone past the days when they made money from sale of chips to contemporary times when they make the bulk of their money from value added services and CUSTOMER SATISFACTION. (Caps mine)
The hustle within the mobile telephony industry clearly demonstrates that the little that any telecom company (telco) could do is to maintain and sustain a customer on their network to which end they could maximize profits for as long as the user buys credits.
The whole thing about giving subscribers something with the right hand and surreptitiously taking it back with the left hand beyond being annoying smacks of mischief; MTN in its usually arbitrary change of policy without recourse to the customer, decided to give 30% bonus on mobile money recharge contrary to the widely publicized 50% promised for patronizing the service long before customers received SMS to that effect.
On the issue of DSTV phones, I thank Allah I never fell for what owners of the handsets are currently facing; having to pay to watch TV on their phones, annoyingly again is the weekly renewal of such subscription. Regulatory bodies as the Communications Ministry and the National Communications Authority (NCA) had better pull the brakes on these Machiavellian 11th century tactics not just MTN but other telcos are employing to fleece the average Ghanaian.
For a record conscious and data savvy institution that MTN is, I am pretty sure that they would by now be asking why particular numbers are not using as much talk time as they hitherto did.
If they already did not know, y’ello! I got some information for them, the entry of dual SIM handsets on the mobile market means that subscribers could still hold on to their numbers and contacts for that matter (MTN), but could grab an AIRTEL, TIGO or VODAFONE CHIP in addition; the price I reiterate is for just GH¢ 1.
Let MTN get this straight; whether with ½, 2, 20, 200, 2000 or 2 million cell sites, all of those sites have left us all reeling under the pressure of truncated calls, being able to receive but not make calls in the abundance of talk time and excruciatingly annoying, ‘ghost’ deductions for no service used. This is reality.
Others have taken to the path of one or the other of GAVET – Glo, Airtel, Vodafone, Expresso, Tigo – who MTN in their series of adverts lately have sought to portray as playing second fiddle to their ‘all-in-all’ super, flawless network.’
Aside the very paltry GH¢ 1 switch to GAVET, we – me and several other aggrieved subscribers regrettably hooked unto MTN – wait in earnest for the day when the much talked about ‘mobile number portability’ becomes operational, then we would assert to the latter our rights better.
I have other ideas and would sooner rather than later pose as MAGVET on line, with my assessment of MTN as an institution and the other telcos.
Until then … a rival chip costs JUST (in every sense of the word) GH¢ 1.
Credit: Abu Musah Kwankwaso
Email: [email protected]
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Comment: Yello MTN! a rival chip costs just GH¢ 1