Archive for September 25th, 2008

5% Services Charges Added To Prepaid Services

Published by Babar Bhatti on September 25, 2008 under Business, Economy, Emerging Markets Telecom, Investment, Mobile Companies, Telecommunications

Dear Prepaid Customer, from now onwards 5% additional service charges (on recharge face value) will be applicable on all recharges via easyload / Jazz / UTopup  or scratch card – for all prepaid customers – Telenor, Mobilink and Ufone.

This has been a rough year for Pakistan’s economy. Now the major mobile operators like Telenor, Mobilink and Ufone have increased the prepaid service cost by 5%. The recent downward trend of the economy has eventually hit the telecom industry. Industry analysts (and this blog) predicted tough situation for the telecom sector so it wasn’t a complete surprise. While the slowdown was expected, the speed at which rates are going up and service is going down is not good. On the one hand public should face the reality that telecom services are not going to be that cheap forever. More importantly, the government should keep its share of taxes within reasonable limits. Let the market figure out the prices. We have enough competition and mobile number portability. We just don’t need the burden of extra taxes.

PTCL Website Mistakes. Does Anyone Care?

Published by Babar Bhatti on September 25, 2008 under Broadband Internet, Business, Marketing, Media, PTCL

A website tells a lot about a company’s attitude towards its customers and service. In case of PTCL it clearly shows that there is not much attention to detail when it comes to typos, grammar and clarity. Consider the following samples from this page about phone-n-net which, by the way, happens to be a good service if you can deal with the usual issues associated with dial-up.

Is telephone call will be charged?
Only one call will be charged as per PTCL rules for 131 number.

Is Phone ‘n’ Net service is a dialup service?
Yes, Its a dialup service.

What is the speed I will get?
The speed you will get will be 56.6kbps

My intention is not to pick on PTCL but to make a point that when a company of this scale puts something on its site, it should be carefully reviewed. But then, PTCL has never been known for caring about its customers.

While we are on this topic of content on the telecom company web sites, see this screen capture from Telenor Djuice site – see anything contradictory?