{"id":224264,"date":"2017-08-13T09:59:19","date_gmt":"2017-08-13T07:59:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=224264"},"modified":"2017-08-13T10:00:42","modified_gmt":"2017-08-13T08:00:42","slug":"cell-c-will-tackle-data-expiry-concerns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/cellular\/224264-cell-c-will-tackle-data-expiry-concerns.html","title":{"rendered":"Cell C will tackle data expiry concerns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cell C plans to tackle the issue of expiring mobile data, CEO Jose Dos Santos told Rapport.<\/p>\n

“We are committed to doing the right thing,” he said.<\/p>\n

His statement follows ICASA publishing proposed changes<\/strong><\/a> to the End-user and Subscriber Service Charter Regulations.<\/p>\n

ICASA wants mobile operators to warn subscribers when their data bundles are about to expire, block automatic out-of-bundle data billing, and let data bundles last longer.<\/p>\n

This means Vodacom, MTN, and Cell C will have to stop you from continuing to use data, and being billed between R1 and R2 per MB, when your bundle is depleted.<\/p>\n

Mobile operators must also extend the validity of a data bundle if a subscriber loads a new bundle before their current one has expired, and must warn subscribers before their bundle expires.<\/p>\n

The proposed validity periods for data bundles are detailed below.<\/p>\n

\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Data bundle<\/th>\nValidity period<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n
\u00a01MB -50MB<\/td>\n10 days<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n
\u00a050MB-500MB<\/td>\n30 days<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u00a0500MB-1GB<\/td>\n60 days<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u00a01GB-5GB<\/td>\n90 days<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u00a05GB-10GB<\/td>\n180 days<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u00a010GB-20GB<\/td>\n12 months<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u00a020GB+<\/td>\n24 months<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

To hell and back<\/h3>\n

Dos Santos also spoke to Rapport about putting their recapitalisation deal together, with\u00a0Blue Label Telecoms acquiring a 45% stake in Cell C<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0for R5.5 billion.<\/p>\n

The signing of the final documents alone took two and half hours, while the deal took\u00a0Dos Santos “to hell and back”.<\/p>\n

It involved 66 overseas trips and thousands of emails – over 4,000 about one issue – said Dos Santos, leaving him wiser and more patient.<\/p>\n

Dos Santos said he learnt the art of walking the line between old and new shareholders, balancing their needs, and trying to accommodate everyone in a sensitive situation.<\/p>\n

Cell C is now 45% owned by Blue Label Telecoms, 30% by 3C Telecommunications, 15% by Net1, and 10% by staff, following the completion of the deal.<\/p>\n

Crucially, its debt has been recaptialised from around R23 billion to R6 billion.<\/p>\n

Cell C now has a strong balance sheet and cash flow, and is ready to show what it can do, he said.<\/p>\n

Now read:\u00a0R2-per-MB out-of-bundle fees must go – ICASA<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cell C plans to tackle the issue of expiring mobile data.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":185806,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[355,45262,35,18090,16074],"class_list":["post-224264","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cellular","tag-cell-c","tag-end-user-and-subscriber-service-charter-regulations","tag-headline","tag-independent-communications-authority-of-south-africa-icasa","tag-jose-dos-santos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224264"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=224264"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224264\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":224266,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224264\/revisions\/224266"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/185806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=224264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=224264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=224264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}