The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) is proposing 30 minutes timeline for mobile network operators (MNOs) in the country to attend to telecom subscribers who come to their care centers for any form of complaint.
A new document titled ‘Draft Quality of Service Business Rules,’ posted on the commission’s website, stated that the business rules stipulate the minimum quality and standards of service, associated measurements, and key performance indicators for measuring quality of service.
Under the customer care section of the Rules, the document indicated that a subscriber’s waiting time to be physically attended to by relevant staff at a customer care centre must not exceed 30 minutes, as against what obtains currently where customers can be kept for hours before being attended to.
The commission stated: “Waiting time to be physically attended to by relevant staff at customer care centers ≤ 30 minutes. The Licensee shall provide means of measuring the waiting time, starting from time of arrival at the premises.”
Similarly, the industry regulator is also determined to ensure that subscribers can speak to a customer care representative of any of the MNOs within five minutes when they make a call to their helplines.
It further clarified: “Where a customer decides to speak to a live agent, the maximum duration allowable on the queue/IVR should be 5 minutes before answer.
“In exceptional cases where a live agent may be unavailable within five minutes to answer the call, a customer should be given an option to hang up to be called back within a maximum time of 30 minutes”, the NCC stressed
However, the commission warned that subscribers may lose their numbers within a year if they do not use them, adding that a subscriber line may be deactivated if it has not been used within six months, for a Revenue Generating Event (RGE), and that if the situation persists for another six months the subscriber may lose their number, except for a network-related fault inhibiting an RGE.
According to the industry regulator, monies left in account on deactivation can be claimed by subscribers once proof of ownership can be established at any given time within 1 year (less any fee paid by the operator for the number within the 1-year of non-RGE).
Also, it proposed that a subscriber with proof of good reason for absence was free to request for line parking.
