The Tribune

By NICO SCAVELLA

AMID numerous complaints of poor cellular service from Bahamas Telecommunications (BTC), company Chief Executive Officer Leon Williams promised customers yesterday that they could expect relief “by the end of October or November.”

While speaking with the media after BTC announced its partnership with the One Bahamas Foundation, Mr Williams said the company is “a little bit more focused” in changing the network and that customers will “begin to feel some of those changes” before the end of the year.

Mr Williams said, however, that obtaining site acquisitions remains “a major challenge” in BTC’s quest for ensuring better coverage for residents.

“BTC over the last couple of years has made some investments in the network, but in my opinion it was like taking a candle to boil an ocean,” Mr Williams said. “We are now a little bit more focused now in what we are doing. Some two to three weeks ago we would have been granted $65-plus million to look at fixing the network, the dropped calls and the mobile network as well as trying to fix the dropped calls on the wiLine network.

“For the last couple of weeks we have been migrating the network, the wiLine fixed network, from a legacy line network to a next generation network. We are trying to install an additional 20-plus cell sites as we speak trying to do the proper acquisition to build the towers to install those cell sites to be able to address the dropped calls situation. We’re hoping that the customers in New Providence will begin to feel some of those changes by the end of October or November.”

BTC’s cellular service has come under increasing fire from the public. In July numerous residents posted to the company’s Facebook page complaints of dropped calls, inability to use data plans, make or receive calls and texts and an internet service that is as “slow as a snail.”

Also in July, President of Superwash Limited Dionisio D’Aguilar criticised BTC for its “sub-standard” service and called for the government to “hasten its step” to introduce a competitor to the market.

Mr D’Aguilar questioned the ongoing upgrades and said BTC constantly announces work to infrastructure but with no evident results. He also predicted that BTC would lose a significant market share of its mobile customers when a cellular competitor is introduced, which, he said, would be warranted given the company’s track record since privatisation in 2011.

Competition

When asked if BTC is ready for a rival in the cellular market, Mr Williams said the company has a “two-fold strategy” in place to deal with potential competition. This involves launching new products and services and “pleasing” current customers. He said, however, that “mitigating” the “technical issues” is what the company is focusing on adding that site acquisitions for the erection of cell towers remain a major challenge for the company in that regard.

“We’re trying our best to win the hearts and minds of Bahamians to get the network into a position where there will be less complaints in terms of the dropped calls so that people become comfortable with the network,” he said. “That’s the first step. Once we get those technical issues addressed then we can go ahead and look at the marketing issues.

“Fundamentally there is no network that doesn’t have flaws. Any new competitors will have issues themselves, so there will always be problems with technical networks ... The hardest thing and most difficult task right now is site acquisitions, getting a place where you can lease the land to put up towers. Most people want good cellular service, but most people don’t want a tower in their back yard, so that’s a major challenge.”

Last month, Prime Minister Perry Christie announced his desires to introduce a competitor to the market “within a year” and said that several providers were interested in entering the Bahamas’ mobile phone market. He said “an English company connected to a Bahamian company”, Cable Bahamas, and international providers Digicel and Virgin Mobile were among those interested in challenging BTC’s mobile phone service.

At the time, he said, no American companies made the list, but he knew “that they have been interested.”

Mr Christie also said that the government can only award one licence, but in 2016 a third company can bid and enter the market if officials feel the industry can sustain more competition.