Telecoms’ quality to be standardised

UCC is working on a policy upon which telecoms will be penalised for offering poor services to consumers.

The state minister for ICT, Mr Nyombi Tembo, has said the government is working on a legal framework to standardise telecoms’ quality of service.

The framework, according to Mr Thembo, is likely to be implemented by 2013.

Speaking at the Huawei Android Application Challenge (HAAC) finale in Kampala on Wednesday, Mr Thembo said the government was working on a legal framework to create a robust quality check that would be the basis for penalising telecoms over poor services quality.

“There has been a general decline in the quality of services offered by telecoms. Telecoms give excuses including unreliable power and vandalism to explain this, but some of these excuses do not count. As government we cannot continue to compromise quality,” he said.

Early this year, Mr Fred Otunnu, the head of communication and consumer affairs at UCC, hinted on a policy that would penelise telecoms with poor service quality.

He said UCC was finalising a penalties schedule, whereby the regulator would charge 10 per cent of telecom’s gross incomes in penalties for poor quality services.

Mr Thembo said: “It is important that telecoms offer high quality services as that is the only way you can have fast ICT growth. The applications developed by students and other people and other ICT projects need high quality services to develop.”

A 2012 Telecommunication in My Eye survey conducted by a group of students and supported by Huawei Technologies, identified poor service coverage, increased rates of dropped calls, poor rural connectivity and poor voice quality as some of the major challenges facing telecommunications subscribers.

The application challenge (HAAC) that was launched in July sought to reward excellent android applications developers with focus on solving local challenges.

Mr Eric Yang, the Huawei Uganda chief executive officer, said the applications developed during the challenge were a testimony to huge potential the country has for local talent.

According to a recent report by ABI, mobile apps would by the close of 2012 have generated about $30 billion in revenue worldwide.

nkalungi@ug.nationmedia.com