A guideline has been sent to the Posts and Telecommunications Division with a view to ensuring quality of services, laying down 7Mbps as the minimum speed of 4G internet.
Earlier, on March, the then chairman of the Bangladesh Telecom Regulatory Commission (BTRC), Dr Shahjahan Mahmood, had told The Independent said that the commission had finalised the quality of service guideline.
A meeting held in the Posts and Telecommunications Division in the presence of the Prime Minister’s ICT adviser, the BTRC was instructed to forward the guideline to the telecom division for approval after necessary amendments. Accordingly, the BTRC has sent the revised guidelines to the post and telecommunication department for approval.
The BTRC will frame the rules once the guidelines are approved. The commission’s acting chairman, Jahurul Haque said it would be easier to pin operator accountability for service quality once the guideline was in place.
The final guideline has a provision that allows mobile phone call drop up to 2 per cent.
Under the rules, the commission will monitor the service quality of broadband operators, mobile operators, fixed phone operators and any other telecom service provider approved by the BTRC.
In the draft rules, four criteria have been set to determine the services quality of mobile phone operators and broadband service providers. The service standard of fixed phone operators will be determined on the basis of three criteria.
According to the rule, serving companies will have to submit reports in a specific manner within the first 10 days of each month.
Operators will submit monthly reports based on four types of areas—those covered by full network, City Corporations, districts and upazilas. The remaining areas will have to give separate reports.
Besides, the BTRC can also issue directives to assess the service quality in a particular area. If the commission wants, it can publish these reports. If any operator fails to maintain the service quality, there guideline provides for a fine of Tk 50 thousand for the first time and Tk 1 lakh subsequently. The BTRC will take action according to the telecommunication law against companies guilty of rule violation.
According to the rules, operators are expected to achieve a 97 per cent success rate in establishing connections. The call drop rate will have to be below 2 per cent. At least 98 per cent of SMS must be successfully delivered.
The call drop rate will have to be below 2 per cent for fixed telephone service providers. Over 97 per cent of calls will have to be successfully put through to the customers of fixed phone operators. A maximum of 7 seconds have been set to get connection.
The minimum download speed of the broadband service has been set at 5Mbps and the upload speed at a minimum of 1 Mbps. The regulator has set a maximum of 3 per cent data packet loss.