Compensate Ghanaians from GH¢34 million telcos sanction fee – Omane Boamah

Former communications Minister, Dr. Edward Omane Boamah has called on government to use part of the GHC34 million sanction cost being demanded from telcos for poor quality service delivery to compensate Ghanaians who suffered the act.

The former Presidential spokesperson is also urging the National Communications Authority (NCA) to be more engaging in their dealings with telcos than being swift ]with punishment, in case of breaches.

“It’s possible to compensate Ghanaians who lost out because of poor quality service. If the NCA sees telcos as cows to be milked, its regulatory approach will be more of sticks instead of regulating mixture of sticks, sermons and carrots.

“Government should use part of the fines to compensate customers while ensuring quality service deliver,” he wrote on Facebook.

The National Communications Authority (NCA) has sanctioned all four Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) for poor services to consumers.

The four network operators sanctioned for their non-compliance with various Quality of Service (QoS) requirements are AirtelTigo, Glo, MTN and Vodafone.

A statement issued by the NCA on Wednesday said the four have been fined a total of GH¢34,065,000.

AirtelTigo is to pay GH¢11,635,000, Glo, GH¢4,460,000, MTN GH¢9,080,000 and Vodafone GH¢8,890,000.

The NCA regularly undertakes QoS Monitoring to determine MNOs’ compliance with their licence conditions and to ensure that consumers receive the quality service they have paid for.

According to the NCA statement, in the first quarter of 2018, the Authority undertook QoS monitoring of all MNOs in the Greater Accra, Eastern, Western, Northern Regions and two districts in the Ashanti Region in the phase one of a nationwide monitoring exercise.

The monitoring enabled the Authority to determine the MNOs which were unable to meet their Licence Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in some District Capitals with regards to QoS; Obligations for Coverage, Data, Voice and Speech Quality.

It said as has been the practice, the NCA subsequently held reconciliation meetings with all four mobile network operators and they were given three months ending August 21, 2018 to cure the infractions detected.

The NCA said at the end of the deadline, it embarked on a follow up monitoring to ascertain if the QoS infractions recorded had been resolved.

This follow up monitoring revealed that though the key performance indicators (KPIs) in some District Capitals had improved, the MNOs were not able to meet the KPI thresholds as per their licences. The NCA as a result has sanctioned the MNOs.