Mobile operators fail quality test: ICASA
The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) conducted a quality of service survey and has found that the largest three mobile operators have failed to meet the minimum requirements for Call Set Up Success Rate (CSSR) and Dropped Call Rate (DCR).
Call Set Up Success Rate refers to the number of attempted calls which for various reasons did not successfully connect.
Dropped Call Rate refers to calls which, due to technical reasons, were cut off before the speaking parties had finished their conversation and before one of them had hung up.
Call Set Up Success Rate and Dropped Call Rate are some of the criteria used to measure operators’ quality of service and standards.
ICASA explained that Quality of service is the collective effect of service performance which determines the degree of satisfaction of a user of the service.
In this context it refers to the capability of a network to provide a quality service to selected network traffic over various technologies such as GSM.
ICASA conducted the sampled quality of service survey on MTN, Vodacom and Cell C’s networks from the 10th to 15th November 2010 in parts of the Gauteng Province.
The Gauteng region monitoring tests focused on network performance in terms of accessibility and retention of voice calls.
Overall Performance
The results of the survey found that MTN did not meet the target in terms of Call Set Up Success Rate, whereas Vodacom and Cell C have complied with this requirement.
Call Setup Success Rate
However, all three operators s failed to meet the target in terms of Dropped Call Rate.
Drop Call Rate
The publication of ICASA’s findings on quality of service coincides with reports of network failure on the eve of the cut-off date for the implementation of the SIM card registration process.
“On Thursday, there were reports of network failure by some operators, and we are going to instruct all network operators to provide a report and an explanation of network problems experienced on 30 June 2011,” ICASA said.
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