Even as mobile service providers (TSPs) like Jio, Airtel, and VI increased tariffs by 10-25% last month, a new survey by LocalCircles reveals that call connection and drop issues remain widespread.
At least 89% of subscribers surveyed face call connection and drop issues while 38% of them face it with over 20% of their calls. According to reports on various social media platforms, it is not only in rural areas that call drop and mobile connection problems are faced as it is commonplace even in big metros. ls. In the case of those who have experienced problems with call connections and call drops “in over 50%” of the cases there is a dip from 19% in 2022 to 17% of respondents this year.
Similarly, for those who indicated problems “10-20%” of the time, there is a slight dip from 35% of respondents to 34%. But in the case of those who have experienced problems “20-50% of the calls” the percentage drop is more from 37% of respondents in 2022 to 21% this year. The change is due to 17% of respondents indicating problems with “0-10% of the calls” and 4% of respondents opting for can’t say this year. However, from 9% of respondents who indicated no problems in 2022, the percentage has dipped to 7% this year. To sum up, call connection and call drop situation shows small improvement between the two surveys conducted by LocalCircles.
One in three citizens regularly use Wi-Fi calling through apps like WhatsApp due to poor network connectivity. There has been a marginal improvement in call quality compared to 2022. 50% of respondents say calls don’t automatically drop within 30 seconds despite a bad connection. There’s an increase in calls dropping automatically within 30 seconds compared to 2022.
Advancement in technology, as TRAI has noted, has not helped to improve mobile connectivity. In the last 2 years, there has been an increase in the percentage of citizens reporting calls dropping automatically within 30 seconds due to bad connection.
The survey findings come amidst consumer dissatisfaction with the recent tariff hikes. Many question the justification for higher prices when network quality remains poor.
TRAI Reviewing Quality Standards:
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is aware of the problem and is reviewing existing quality of service (QoS) rules. This includes bringing 4G and 5G services under its ambit and setting stricter call drop parameters.
In a statement issued in August 2023, the telecom authority said complaints about call drops and other network related issues have risen after the rollout of 5G services. After detailed analysis of quarterly QoS performance reports, it has noted that due to long performance assessment period of a quarter over a large area like Licensed Spectrum Access (LSA), there may be pockets or areas experiencing poor quality of service due to averaging effect while service providers are meeting overall QoS benchmark at LSA level. TRAI stated that the proposed change will help respective state/UT governments in facilitating service providers in improving QoS in the State /UT as and when required.
Despite technological advancement in mobile telecommunications and advancement in performance management tools, the quality of experience (QoE) of consumers has not improved as expected though such quality of service (QoS)
requirements is supported by technology standards.
“Even with widespread coverage of 4G networks in the country and rollout of 5G services, there are an increasing number of complaints of call drops, call muting, low data throughput, etc., which raises question marks on the network design and provisioning of required network resources,” Trai said. The regulator has proposed to tighten call drop parameters, call success rate, etc., under the quality-of-service rules.
The regulator stressed that the Standards of Quality of Service for Wireless Data Services were notified in the era of 2G and 3G services wherein data services were delivered over circuit-switched networks and their QoS performance benchmarks were set based on the capability of underlying technology. At present, packet core networks with LTE (4G), LTE-Advanced and 5G technology constitute more than 75% of the telecom network in the country. It said that the present QoS benchmark envisages latency to be less than 250 milliseconds (ms) for wireless data services and less than 120ms for wireline broadband service which are not in sync with the requirement of present-day applications.
TRAI noted that as 4G and 5G networks are providing much wider coverage in the country compared to the 2G and 3G networks, therefore stringent performance benchmarks, especially related to call drops, are proposed for 4G and 5G services to improve consumer experience. Network availability is an important requirement for good QoS.
Given the regular complaints from mobile subscribers over the last 12 months, LocalCircles conducted its national survey to gauge consumers’ experience with mobile networks in the last 3 months and how many times they have had to switch to data services to make calls. The survey received over 32,000 responses from citizens located in 362 districts of India.
LocalCircles Demands Action:
LocalCircles plans to share the findings of the survey with the Ministry of Telecommunications and TRAI, urging them to hold telecom operators accountable for service quality, especially considering the recent price hikes.
First Published: Jul 15 2024 | 12:28 PM IST
