MNP to benefit mobile phone subscribers

Arjun Raghunath
The New Indian Express

10 Nov 2010
THIRUVANATHAPURAM: No surprise, if the two croreplus mobile phone subscribers in the State enjoy stateoftheart customer care and attractive offers from their cellular service providers in the coming days. Thanks to the Mobile Number Portability (MNP) scheme to be introduced soon.
MNP, which allows a mobile phone subscriber to switch to another cellular service provider by retaining his mobile phone number, will force the service providers to ensure 100 percent customer satisfaction so that its customer base do not erode. MNP is scheduled to be launched in Haryana on November 25 and would be extended to other states by December.
It has been alleged that a formal launch of the MNP was postponed a couple of times owing to stiff pressure from the cellular service providers on the Department of Telecommunications.
''Ultimately, the customer is going to be the king. So far, however poor is the service offered by the provider, the mobile phone subscribers had no option but to stick to their existing connection so as to retain the number. But with the introduction of MNP, customer care would have to be given utmost priority by the service providers,'' highly placed sources in the telecom sector point out. With more than two crore cellular connections, the mobile phone industry has almost reached a saturation point in Kerala which has a total population of around three crore.
Already, there is an intensive competition between the cellular service providers to woo customers from other service providers.
This would become more intensive with the introduction of MNP and the customer would benefit from it. At present, Idea cellular service has the highest number of subscribers in Kerala, 60 lakh, followed by Vodafone, 47 lakh. BSNL, which was once leading the tally, is now pushed to the third place with 43.6 lakh connections, according to the figures available with the Cellular Operators Association of India.
''BSNL, being a governmentcontrolled organisation, has its own disadvantages when it comes to marketing. Compared to private sector, decision making involves more time in the case of a government firm.
Hence, the future of the BSNL with the introduction of MNP may become further bleak,'' said sources.
Though 'Express' contacted the senior officials of the leading mobile phone service providers in the State and enquired about the strategies they are chalking out to face the stiff competition with the launch of MNP, all of them preferred to keep mum.
The charge for switching from one user to the other is fixed by the DoT at Rs 19. Once shifted to a new service provider, a customer could make a further change in service provider only after a specific period.