Spotlight on SamoaTel - Community Group Slams
HomeZone...
Citizens’ Coalition for Accountability
in Telecommunications in Samoa (CCATS) is a non-partisan
group of Samoans whose goal is to provide public awareness
on telecommunication issues that adversely affect the public.
See their website: www.CCATSamoa.info for more details, other
articles and contact information.
Many years ago, visionary and forward-looking minds implemented
a fibre optics network in Samoa, knowing that the rather
colossal capital investment would pay off in due time. Despite
some controversies surrounding the contracting arrangements,
Samoa today has access to modern telecommunication services
as a direct result of that bold investment back then.
Now we see SamoaTel claiming that it is too expensive to
extending its basic landline infrastructure to the people
who need telephone and internet services (landline penetration
in rural areas is a shameful 2%!) and instead taking the
quick-fix shortcut of expanding its inferior HomeZone service – which
it does not mention is incapable of internet or fax. Where
is the commitment to ICT’s (Information and Communications
Technologies)* and the Government’s commitment “to
expanding rural access to communications services and Internet
applications” **
What has happened to all the visionaries, technical genius
and hands-on managers? The visionaries seem to have been
replaced by ads-men and image makers, technical competence
stifled by a bureaucratic machinery, and the genius and critical
minds leaving or being fired by short-sighted management
atop in an attempt to divert blame for inadequacies.
Who Wants HomeZone Anyway?
Despite SamoaTel’s recent wave of advertising campaign “introducing” the
HomeZone service (in Apia?), this service has been in operation
for over 3 years in Upolu and Savaii. With a history of disastrous
billing and unacceptable service level (see our website for
details) that partly continues to the present time, HomeZone
service is a classic example of the short-sighted business
practices of SamoaTel. Instead of a modest investment in
landline services to provide basic telephone services to
much neglected rural areas, with equitable service level
and pricing for the end-user, SamoaTel has over time spent
millions of tala for an inferior prepaid, voice only service
that costs the end-user more to use (compared to landline
telephone service), is unreliable, is incapable of fax and
internet access (thus undermines economic and social development
and growth in rural areas), is useless in emergency situations
such as cyclone as it requires main power to operate – and
did we say, it costs considerably more!
HomeZone a Dis-Service to Rural Samoa
Let’s face it, the majority of Samoans live in rural
areas. With a landline telephone penetration of about 2 percent
in rural areas (shame on SamoaTel!) guess what SamoaTel is
after – right, a large captive audience to charge even
more, and that, for an inferior service. This spells as maximum
profit for minimum investment. How much more does HomeZone
service cost to the end user? To illustrate, let’s
compare the monthly charges for both landline and HomeZone
services in a real life situation:
Landline Homezone
===============================================================
10 local calls under 15 minutes 1.24 2.48
10 local calls over 15 minutes 1.24 4.95
10 local calls over 30 minutes 1.24 7.43
10 national calls each 10 min 20.25 40.50
10 mobile calls each 10 min 30.38 43.88
Monthly charge 10.23 0
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total: 54.35 99.24
In this scenario a HomeZone user pays almost twice as much
as a counterpart landline customer, let’s say in Apia.
This amount is significantly higher if one makes more calls.
All this in addition to the high start-up cost of $299 for
HomeZone versus only $60 for landline service. Furthermore,
HomeZone service (which is nothing but a watered-down GSM
mobile service) is incapable of fax and internet – and
this will never change despite misleading allusions to enhanced
services in the future. Do we, rural customers, have to give
in to the pressures of a short-sighted SamoaTel management?
No, we don’t have to. Talk to the MP of your area and
express your concerns and/or start a signature petition following
the example of Aleisa residents.
Ask Questions and Demand Precise Answers
Some of the questions asked are fobbed off by SamoaTel with
generic answers. Typical answers by SamoaTel to the question
on “why landline services are not available in an area” are
given in a broad, baseless, meaningless or misleading manner
such as: it costs too much, technically impossible, area
inaccessible, economically not viable, or, cunningly, phone
services will be available end of July. Ask for clarification
on what constitutes too much, how is it technically impossible,
in what way is an area inaccessible, what study shows the
investment is not viable, what kind of phone services will
be available end of July (if HomeZone, it is by far not a
substitute for true landline service). In fact the answers
are all already known: There is no inhabited area in Samoa
that is inaccessible for landline telephone services. Technically
there is absolutely no obstacle to extending landline services
to a given area – after all the capacity is now bearable
by the new, expensive and under-utilised switch, and the
technology is mature and diverse (i.e. copper, fibre optics,
microwave link, etc.). The cost for extending landline services
is a capital investment, not an expense and the return on
investment should be measured over time and in conjunction
with social and economic development (attracting businesses
and new residents, connecting schools, women’s committees,
churches, etc.) In certain populated areas close to Apia,
such as Aleisa, cost benefit analysis would be straight-forward
and the return highly profitable – after all it does
not take more than 200,000 tala capital investment to bring
landline services to more than 2,000 residents of Aleisa
and vicinity! (compare this to SAT 715,500*** “upgrade” of
the defunct HomeZone service in November 2004). And where
the investment is truly not viable, SamoaTel is bound by
its Community Service Obligation and eligible for appropriate
CSO funding upon request.
Who Cares About the People
Having stated all these irrefutable facts one must logically
ask why SamoaTel is not doing anything about extending the
rural area landline services, while stifling new landline
applications and dragging its feet in serving the growing
number of waiting landline applicants. The most obvious answer
is simple but a sad one: SamoaTel executive management does
not care about the people and the future of Samoa. What it
cares about is short-term economical gains (spelled out:
prepaid cards, HomeZone, GSM Network vs landline) and keeping
an instant, large and captive audience in need of telecommunication
services in order to maximise profit and entice hesitant
new GSM operators for business in Samoa.
After all the contract span of a top executive is only a
couple of years and the bottom line numbers are indicators
of their success. While it is expected that with the new
GSM network in place the South Pacific Games will bring big
profits as a result of high telecommunications traffic, overseas
roaming charges and handset and SIM card sales and rental,
after the games, however, Samoa will be left high and dry.
In the meantime the executive employment contracts have elapsed,
millions paid out in executive salaries and we are left at
square one.
SamoaTel Still Liable for Refunds
We would like to remind SamoaTel that they have a legal
liability to refund all residential and business postpaid
and HomeZone customers for their blatant billing errors of
the past few years (as we detailed in our previous articles)
and that we will not shy away from pursuing these matters
further.
And One More Thing…
In case SamoaTel is not aware of the fact, in matters of
marketing, relevance, moderation and consistency in advertising
are as important as tastefulness. Inundating the airwaves
with tasteless 50’s style advertising (at times repeating
same ad every few minutes) is just repulsive. Instead of
burning up money, why doesn’t SamoaTel use it fairly
where it is most needed? Is there anyone who knows and would
be willing to share the annual marketing budget of SamoaTel?
After all, SamoaTel’s financial summaries should be
public record.
Notes and References:
===============================================================
* Samoa National ICT Steering Committee: “The Government
of Samoa has recognised ICT an important tool for social
development, economic growth, and political progress of Samoa
and made every effort to develop ICT at the national level.” Statement
from document “Contribution to the Second Phase of
WSIS”
** Cited in the paper published by Ministry of Communication
and Information Technology “New Telecommunications
Licensing Regime for Samoa” – November 2005,
page 7. Also, originally an excerpt from The World Bank,
Report 24794, November 2002.
*** Article published by Samoa Observer: “Palusalue
Launches Phone Service From Mount”, 25 November 2004
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