Thread: Airtel, BPL, Idea, MTNL, Spice fail TRAI benchmark

Hi all,
This is interesting.

Airtel BPL Idea MTNL Spice fail TRAI benchmark - CIOL News Reports

Airtel, BPL, Idea, MTNL, Spice fail TRAI benchmark
CyberMedia's Voice & Data Mobile User Satisfaction Survey 2008 reveals, Virgin Mobile tops user satisfaction in India
Thursday, January 15, 2009

NEW DELHI, INDIA: A nation-wide mobile users' satisfaction survey, conducted by CyberMedia's flagship communications industry monthly Voice&Data,reveals that Virgin Mobile topped user satisfaction in 2008 while players like Airtel, BPL, Idea, MTNL and Spice fell short of the benchmark set by telecom watchdog Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).

Consumer satisfaction levels improved in 2008 compared to last year as five operators (out of 11) crossed the TRAI user satisfaction benchmark against three service providers in 007, according to the online survey conducted by Voice&Data in association with uxtConsult, an online research firm. A sample of 1,318 mobile users in India was quizzed on various factors to determine overall user satisfaction.

BSNL and Vodafone rubbed shoulders for the second spot with scores of 91.96% and 91.97%, respectively. The two other players to cross the TRAI benchmark of 90% are Reliance ommunications and Tata Indicom.

Last year's top scorer Aircel slipped from 92.23% last year to 85.44% this year, according to the online survey results released by Voice&Data in its January issue.

"A side effect of the scorching pace of growth of the mobile phones in India is the rapid drop in quality of service. Five major players Airtel, BPL, Idea, MTNL, Spice have yet o touch their previous best score achieved in 2005. This is a cause for major concern," CyberMedia's Chief Editor Prasanto K. Roy said on the results of the survey.

"We see rapidly declining quality of service stemming from poor network availability and lack of customer care as the top issues for the mobile players," Roy added. "This is nfortunate because millions of low-ARPU users may tolerate poor QoS, it's the high-usage customers who bump up the ARPU that are likely to be a lot less tolerant of poor service. That is dangerous for the operators."

The survey conducted during October November 2008 recorded user satisfaction on five broad parameters presales/sales, network availability, VAS, customer care, and billing.

Expectedly, each of the service providers exceeded the 90% user satisfaction benchmark with on the presales and sales parameter with Virgin Mobile topping the list followed by MTNL, leaving behind Airtel and Vodafone.

Users participating in the survey found BPL and MTNL's network performance most satisfactory with high scores of 98.2% and 97% respectively with Airtel and Idea just making the cut above the 90% mark.

On the Value Added Services (VAS) parameter BSNL topped the charts with only Idea and Aircel performing below the TRAI benchmark.

Interestingly on the customer care parameter none of the 11 players, including the topper Virgin Mobile, could muster enough support from users to get past the 90% benchmark. In terms of billing integrity the four toppers were Virgin, Vodafone, BSNL and Reliance.

The average waiting time to speak to a customer care representative of Airtel and BSNL was 4.8 minutes. Idea and Spice customer had to wait an average of 5 minutes with Vodafone aving to wait 5.2 minutes.

SMS, Long Distance Calling, Call Waiting Top services list

SMS (94.8%), long distance calling (70%) and call waiting (58.1%) were the top 3 mobile services reported by the users. Roaming, ring tune / caller tune downloads, call forwarding / diverts and SMS chatting were the other popular features with at least one in two users reporting usage.

The business applications like GPRS / Internet (42.8%), voice mail (37%) and call conferencing (30%) were the next in terms of popularity.

The top mobile value added services used include entertainment jokes, astrology, games (25%) and cricket (20.8%).

Nearly one in five users reported using mobile banking, participating in contests and promotions and leaving voice messages regularly.

While one in six users subscribes to info services news, stocks, finance-only one in seven uses the rail reservation and air check-in and dial-in services like ordering food and taxi.

User satisfaction in Metro Circles Improves Mobile services in metro circles improved during 2008 with all the operators, except Aircel, showing higher customer satisfaction and rossing the benchmark set by TRAI. Tata Indicom ranked first in the metro circles, followed by BPL, Vodafone and BSNL with very close scores.

However, of the 8 service providers in A Circles BSNL (93.7%), Vodafone (91.6%), Reliance (91.3%) and Aircel (90.3%) crossed the cut off in customer satisfaction. Only BSNL, Vodafone and Reliance improved upon their previous year scores.

In B and C circles Tata Indicom topped the services chart at 96.5%. Bharti Airtel was second scoring 93.1%. In these circles all operators leaving Aircel and Idea reached the TRAI benchmark.

For third consecutive year Airtel was the Top of the Mind Brand. Vodafone was second in the list of most recalled brands.

In 2009 new QoS measures might be introduced in the wake of TRAI floating a consultation paper to bring stringent quality benchmarks.

Most attractive tariffs

One in three participants in the survey believe that Airtel offers the most effective tariff plans. One in seven users perceive BSNL, Vodafone and Idea to be offering the least cost options.

The percentage of users who have been using mobile phones for over 3 years has grown steadily-from 42.6% to 57.5%-since the survey was first conducted 3 years ago.

The SAARC Region

Similar surveys were conducted in SAARC nations to trace the mobile user satisfaction. A total of 843 mobile subscribers were interviewed for the survey in Pakistan, 594 in Bangladesh, 272 in Sri Lanka, 150 in Bhutan, 226 in Maldives and 139 in Nepal. Afghanistan was not covered since the country does not have Internet penetration strong enough to conduct the survey.

Top scorers for overall satisfaction levels in the SAARC countries are as follows:

Bangladesh Sheba Telecom
Bhutan Bhutan Telecom
Maldives Dhiraagu
Nepal Spice Nepal
Pakistan Warid Telecom
Sri Lanka Lanka Cellular

Mobile users across SAARC region voted SMS as the most popular application. 3G awareness was the highest in Bangladesh.

About the Survey

JuxtConsult, an online research firm, conducted an online survey in October-November 2008 in association with Voice&Data. Parameters such as sales and presales (1% weightage), network quality (33%), value added services (14%), customer care (36%) and billing integrity (16%) are driving customer satisfaction.

An independent telephonic validation of 50% of the respondents to verify their authenticity was also done. Around 98% of the respondents picked up the call and there was less than one per cent error for almost all the questions validated during the process.

©CIOL Bureau

I wonder how and when such surveys are conducted. Sometimes my city is mentioned in a survey but I've rarely people being interviewed, forms distributed, etc. in crowded places such as malls, multiplexes, etc. So, I do have a question on these surveys.

Anyway, nice article. Repo awarded.

I also have questions on these surveys

TRAI has now warned the service providers to provide good QOS or change the billing to per second rather than per minute.

Originally Posted by cool_techie_tvm

TRAI has now warned the service providers to provide good QOS or change the billing to per second rather than per minute.

will any service providers change their billing to per second system in near future? ...

Originally Posted by saurav_kataruka

will any service providers change their billing to per second system in near future? ...

In Kerala BPL used to do it, back in 2002. But if the network congestion and call drops keeps on growing at the current pace, then we can surely expect per second billing.

I think the only solution is to give TRAI more authority.

In addition to this ensure that when the license is provided for a Telecom Circle the service provider is given a strict contractual deadline to implement a certain infrastructure requirement per lakh subscribers.

This should ensure that the bottlenecks and congestion that we see today on the networks are avoided

Originally Posted by cool_techie_tvm

In Kerala BPL used to do it, back in 2002. But if the network congestion and call drops keeps on growing at the current pace, then we can surely expect per second billing.

that would be great actually for the users ... very much like - pay only for what you actually use..

Originally Posted by saurav_kataruka

that would be great actually for the users ... very much like - pay only for what you actually use..

Yes, that used to be their tag-line back in those days. Unfortunately Hutch bought BPL Mobile and promptly the per second billing was abolished.

even TATA indicom started with per second billing

how the heck bsnl scores so much in qos?? :x it sucks (atleast in kolkata), im facing a lot of problems with it & notified CC hell lot of time, nothing happens, & im going to leave it soon.

Oh comeon. The QOS provided by BSNL atleast in Kerala is praiseworthy. During important days like Christmas, NewYear BSNL is the only network in Kerala which stands tall while others loose hope and fail when the network gets congested.

Frankly i think the QOS varies upon different states. Heard that Vodafone rocks in Mumbai and Airtel rocks in Delhi just like Aircel is doing good in Chennai.

yes ... aircel is also doing very good in eastern regions ... specially in kolkata ...