By Angeline Ngbele, Correspondent Abuja
Barely 24 hours after it announced its decision to revise its determination on Unstructured Supplementary Service Data(USSD) pricing established in 2019, telecommunications referee, the Nigerian Communications Commission(NCC), says commercial banks in the country are owing telecommunications companies over N17billion(US$44.68million), according to the Executive Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer(EVC/CEO) of the Commission, Prof. Umar Garba Danbatta.
According to a statement by the Director of Public Affairs at the Commission, Dr. Ikechukwu Adinde, Prof. Danbatta made the revelation while speaking as Special Guest at the Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria(ATCON’s) virtual forum over Zoom on “Meeting the Interests of Government, Consumers and Telecoms Companies in the Era of COVID-19 and Post COVID-19 Pandemic for Digital Economy Development”.
At the webinar, according to Adinde, Danbatta noted that the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami had already been briefed on the development with a view to ensuring a quick settlement of the debt.
Explaining the Commission’s efforts at resolving consumer-related issues, at the virtual event, the EVC/CEO of the NCC also noted that when the Commission introduced the Do-Not-Disturb (DND) code in 2015, less than 500,000 people activated the code, but there were currently 22,722,366 lines on the DND.
Danbatta further stated that ninety-eight per cent (98%) of the total service-related complaints received from telecoms consumers within a 15-month period, spanning January 2019 to April 2020, had been successfully resolved by the Commission.
On quality of service, Danbatta said “the Commission has monthly engagements with operators as well as quarterly industry working group on Quality of Service and Short Codes, and is currently monitoring 2G Key Performance Indicators, while the KPIs for 4G are being prepared.”
It would be recalled that the NCC, in a statement released to the media recently, observed that the amendment to its USSD Determination was necessitated by a protracted dispute between Mobile Network Operators and Financial Institutions on the applicable charges for USSD services and the method of billing.
Giving rationale for the USSD determination revision, the Commission explained its stance as a responsive and effective regulatory authority that recognised its policies were not cast on stone but and might be modified from time to time as circumstances demanded.
The chief telecoms regulator added the Commission revised the Determination previously issued by removing the Price Floor and the Cap to allow Mobile Network Operators and the banks negotiate rates that would be mutually beneficial to all parties concerned the in the interest of the consumers and other stakeholders.
The NCC also determined that Mobile Network Operators must not charge the consumers directly for the use of USSD channels for financial services in the form of end-user-billing, but revert to corporate billing thus restricting the transaction primarily between the MNOs and the entity to which the service was provided namely Banks and Financial Institutions.
