Mobile swappers prefer Robi above others

Robi has gained about 4.96 lakh new customers who have switched their operators without changing their 11-digit number using mobile number portability in the last one year.

At the same time, another 1.69 lakh customers left Robi's network.

A total of 690,550 mobile phone users have successfully switched their operators and another 256,733 customers attempted to switch their network but failed on different grounds, said a report published by the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission yesterday.

However, of three private operators, Banglalink received the least number of customers (68,528) under mobile number portability service, while 28,190 users left them.

Grameenphone is in the second position in terms of acquiring new customers. The mobile operator has received 1.21 lakh customers while lost 58,739.

State-owned Teletalk stands at the last position in both the segments. They got 4,427 customers from other operators and lost 8,101 from October last year to September this year.

Shahed Alam, chief corporate and regulatory officer, Robi Axiata Ltd, said the BTRC report on mobile number portability service clearly shows that Robi has emerged as the most preferred mobile operator of the country.

However, the report also says more than 50 percent of the subscribers, who wanted to avail the mobile number portability service, could not do so due to various technical problems.

"Especially, certain corporate customers are facing problems that can only be termed as utter harassment. We believe the mobile number portability service would be successful only when everyone, who wishes to avail it, can do so without any hindrance of any form," he said.

He urged the regulators and the mobile number portability service providers to look into this issue urgently to make the process of switching network operator seamless. 

Ankit Sureka, senior manager, corporate communications at Banglalink said, "We welcomed the mobile number portability as it gave customers the freedom to choose any operator keeping their mobile numbers unchanged." 

"However, we are mostly focused on our overall business growth. We have turned around significantly registering impressive overall results this year, and are trying to improve our performance further." 

He said Banglalink's customer-base grew by 3.1% year-on-year in the 2nd quarter of 2019. "Our improvements are also highlighted by a 5.4% year-on-year total revenue growth and a 7.8% year-om-year service revenue growth," he continued, "the data revenue increased by 28% year-on-year, which reflects our gradual emergence as a prominent digital player in the market. We are confident of keeping the momentum going throughout the rest of the year."