KARACHI, Sept 19: The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority is conducting yet another survey of Mobilink. Sources told Dawn on Monday that the quality of service survey would be over within a month. They recalled that sometime back the telecoms regulator decided to take action against the country’s largest cellphone company on the basis of a previous quality of service survey.
“Instead, the PTA decided to conduct another quality of service survey,” they said, adding that the telecoms regulator had warned Mobilink in April that it would slap a Rs350 million fine on it and terminate its licence if the mobile phone company did not respond to a show-cause notice within 30 days.
A spokesman for Mobilink confirmed that a survey was under way. “The PTA made it clear that the show-cause notice was issued against Mobilink when a PTA survey found that the quality of service offered by the mobile phone company was below the minimum standards given in the licence,” the sources said.
But in a highly questionable move, the PTA decided on July 8 to carry out another quality of service survey, they said.
The sources recalled that Mobilink had sent a request to the prime minister with a letter saying that $300 million assistance offered to it by a European company had been cancelled because of the steps being taken by the PTA. They said the prime minister had forwarded the Mobilink letter to the PTA.
A press statement issued by the PTA on July 8 says: “In a letter written to M/s Mobilink, the Authority said that the arguments, the operator presented during the hearing in response to PTA show-cause notice on poor QoS, were just to avoid the allegations on one pretext or the other. The Authority said that the plea taken by the licensee regarding factors influencing QoS were unfounded and unreasonable.
“During the hearing on June 9, 2005, the Authority also observed that the management of the company did not take appropriate measures to improve QoS offered by the company and as a result the subscribes continued to suffer.”
