Mobile phone adverts relocated

DAILY NEWS Reporter

BARELY two days after the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) banned all mobile phone ‘annoying’ promotional adverts before a call is connected, citizens have praised the authority’s decision.

The annoying adverts have been reduced or relocated. Speaking with the‘Daily News’ in Dar es Salaam yesterday, residents said some of them have no clue of where to report on related issues. They often end up calling mobile phone operators (customer care) with no action taken.

“Frankly I was really disturbed by the adverts before my calls were connected and I called the mobile phones operator several times with no action taken. More education is needed to citizens on how to file cases on ‘unwanted services’ offered by mobile phone companies,” said Kassim Zein from Kijitonyama.

Another resident, Asha Ibrahim, urged TCRA to look at the quality of services provided by the operators. She said that some of them offer low standard services.

“There are many concerns from mobile phone users including that of ‘unwanted’ advertisements or music before being connected and poor services. There might be an emergency call but due to the poor services, the company says the number is unavailable while the phone of that particular person is on air,” she lamented.

It was, however, observed that mobile phone operators have started complying with the communication watchdog’s directives as calls were directly connected without advertisements or music before being connected like in previous days.

On Thursday, this week, TCRA Director General Engineer James Kilaba issued a ban, saying that it is against the Electronic and Postal Communications (Values Added Services) and Consumer Protection regulations of 2015 and 2011 respectively.

Eng Kilaba said the decision has been made after the authority received many complaints raised by many mobile phones users on the issue of advertising or promotion announcements offered by mobile phone companies before a client’s call is connected.

He added that all operators had agreed to halt the adverts effective on July 6, this year. He urged the service providers to abide by the regulations and provide quality services to their customers as the authority is satisfied that some of the mobile service providers are not abiding by the regulations.

According to the TCRA boss, those who will go against the order or directives of the authority will face the consequences. The maximum penalty is revocation of the service provider’s licence.

Giving more clarification on the matter, Eng Kilaba urged the mobile phones services firms in the country (which has the custom of providing to their customers with business adverts) to halt them and ensure they connect them directly without wasting their precious time.

However Eng Kilaba unveiled that business adverts are not prohibited to be provided by the mobile phones service operators but the only problem with the adverts is where they are slotted by the operators and that has been a major problem to many of their customers.