By Aaron Ukodie
The Association of Licensed Telecom Companies of Nigeria (ALTON) has said it is wrong for the minister of communications and Digital Economy, Dr Isa Pantami, to order the Deactivation of Voice Mail (VM) Protocol by Service Providers’ Network.
ALTON argues that the Minister cannot make the VM deactivation a major “policy issue” within the meaning of S. 23&24 of the NCA which empower the Minister to formulate “general policy for the communications sector…” After consultations organised by the NCC, because it is a mere operational and consumer protection issue which the Ministry can simply call NCC’s attention to.
“It is a purely consumer related issues that minister refers to as a major policy issue and it also amounts to unnecessary interference by the Minister contrary to Section 25 subsections 1 & 2 of the Nigerian Communications Act 2003”, the ALTON statement stated.
ALTON said Voicemail (VM) is a value-added service and only those who opt-in should have it, adding that the current practice on some networks is that once you call and the recipient doesn’t pick, you get a voice prompt saying that the subscriber is not available and asking you to record a voice message *after the tone.
Adebayo said consumers are not billed anything for the service, but if they delay in the use of the service, they may be charged for a few seconds, or for the time it takes them to record the message, but the recipient of the voice mail does not get charged for listening. It is free.
According to him, the telcos reintroduced the VM facility to discourage people who “flash” continuously as flashing wastes network resources and also degrades QoS reporting, even though ALTON agrees that the way that is being done by some networks is not justifiable.
Pantami, had ordered the deactivation of Automatic Voice Mails (AVM), across all Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) in Nigeria. Pantami MNOs were exploiting consumers through the practice.
According to him, the voicemail service should be accessed at the discretion of the subscriber and not by default. Pantami said the exercise is worrisome and totally unacceptable, as telecoms subscribers incur financial charges for a service they are compelled to use by default.
“Voicemail is not a popular service among mobile phone users in Nigeria, coupled with the language challenge among rural dwellers, who mostly do not understand the language deployed by these networks.‘‘It is apparent, that the recent clampdown on the exploitative activities of some MNOs in the country has beamed the searchlight on the sector properly, and some unpatriotic elements in the system are devising subtle, ingenious methods of defrauding Nigerians,” he stressed.
Pantami said the current leadership will neither overlook any acts, regardless of how subtle, that undermine the anti-corruption crusade of President Muhammadu Buhari, nor condone any attempts to defraud Nigerians and indeed, all subscribers.
“It is our collective responsibility to ensure that the rights of consumers are protected, while providing a conducive business environment for MNOs, in line with global best practice,”
