New set of rules for telcos to boost quality of service

Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) has stepped up its oversight role on the quality of service by telecommunications firms with proposed tougher regulations.

The proposed new regulatory framework for assessment of the quality of service (QoS) for telcos was published on Wednesday by the regulator in a consultation paper which calls for the public to share their views on the same.

The move comes after the CA failed to hire an independent third party to conduct the survey on QoS offered by the mobile providers, citing procurement challenges.

The proposed regulations have expanded range of services under the regulator’s watch to include SMS and internet services, adding to voice services which have been the main focus.

Customer experience

The approach will see Internet service providers like AccessKenya, Wananchi Group and fibre optic companies such as Jamii Telecoms and Liquid Telecom subjected to quality checks.

CA requires the operators to achieve a score of 80 per cent on eight indicators, including speech quality, completed calls, call success rate and drop rate.

Under the new proposals, the operators will also be required to achieve a 20 per cent threshold on both network performance and overall customer experience. This will be besides meeting the CA’s set standard of 60 per cent on overall network performance.

All the three operators Airtel, Safaricom and Telkom Kenya fell short of the 80 per cent target quality mark. They all attained 62.5 per cent, as per the latest CA report. The operators have not met the threshold for the third year in a row.

Consumer input is also to be incorporated, with CA proposing an annual customer satisfaction survey relating to network availability, service quality, service tariffs, and customer care aspects among others.

Francis Wangusi, director general CA said the review of the QoS regulations has been necessitated by the rapid changes and adoption of new technologies and services.