MTN Ghana says the recent protracted service interruptions on its network are due to a “hardware problem”, which it said had been resolved.
The hardware problem occurred in the midst ongoing modernization and network transformation meant to provide better experience for MTN customers.
The company has however apologized to ‘the few’ customers affected those recent challenges, which included frequent speech mutation, call drops, calls not going through and delays in call set up.
Some other challenges are SMS not going through and very poor data experience, characterized by very slow download and upload.
Indeed, in all of these challenges, customers complained of losing money, particularly when calls drop or speech mutes and one would have to call back. Again slow downloads/uploads meant one achieved very little over a long period of time, and lost data credit.
Telcos have often blamed service interruptions on fibre cuts, power outages, cable theft and on the poor quality of handsets some customers use; but this time MTN had admitted the few days of continuous poor service on its own hardware problem due to internal activities.
Senior Manager for Radio Access Planning at MTN Ghana, Reuben Opata told ADOMBUSINESS the challenge affected a handful of areas in Accra and parts of the other regions but was not wide spread.
“If you consider our customer base it was only about 15% of customers that were affected,” he said.
He noted that MTN had earlier announced a complete network modernization and transformation project to improve customer experience, adding that the modernization project is well-advanced and nearing completion.
Reuben Opata explained that the modernization project involved replacement of certain equipment at the cell sites, which meant that for each cell site that work takes place at any given time, customers within the catchment area of that cell site could be affected.
He was however quick to point out that “we usually work in late night when traffic on the network is at its barest minimum but sometime a few challenges drag on till early the following morning.”
Reuben Opata assured customers that when the network modernization and transformation is completed, customers would have a better experience on the MTN network. Meanwhile, the hardware problem, which caused the recent challenges, he said, has been resolves.
“Any isolated challenges should therefore be reported our customer service centres on 111 and they would be resolved immediately,” he said.