Mobile Chaos: Dropped-call Frustrations Mounting

[Thanh-BKK]

A computer with a LPT port.

A little electronics knowledge.

A soldering iron.

Electronic parts from the TV repair shop around the corner, total price below 100 Baht.

One hour work.

Two freely downloadable programs.

That's all it takes to change the IMEI in just about any phone, unlock any network and/or SIM lock and make stolen phones fit for resale.

How i know?

Because i built myself a "flasher" as the device is called with the above components. My reason was being stuck with a non-working phone that needed a software-upgrade and, because it was a old phone, nobody in MBK bothered. Now i can flash the entire Nokia DCT-3 series (flashing = software up/downgrade) and many others, and perform the other mentioned actions such as IMEI change and unlocking.

(and before someone gets the idea of approaching me, NO, i do NOT do that for others!)

Besides an IMEI lock does NOT send anything to the phone. Instead when the phone tries to log onto the network, it has to register itself, thereby sending it's IMEI and the SIM serial number to the network. if the phone is listed as stolen and blocked, the network refuses to let that phone register. Nothing is send to the phone itself, and the actual phone is still perfectly usable - on either another network in that same country or in another country, without any change to the phone (IMEI) at all. There is a lively trade in such phones around the globe......

Best method to prevent phone theft: US-style CDMA phones without SIM. Backwards, yes. But the information that would be on the SIM is there programmed into the phone, and the software to reprogram those is with the network operators and as safe as in Fort Knox. Phone stolen/lost = completely useless to whoever has it, it's not reprogrammable by the user and therefor can't be used. Downside: Not easy to change phone for the user - no SIM to swap, instead a new phone has to be programmmed with that user's data.

Here in Thailand even CDMA uses SIM, as beside Thailand only in China and Indonesia. Definitely the way to go, but also Hutch does not have a ESN blocking system in place (CDMA phones are NOT as easy reprogrammed as GSM phones! ESN (IMEI equivalent) changing is almost impossible for most models).

I'm just a mobile-phone-enthusiast who's bothered by the inability of reaching his boyfriend in the evening.

Regards.....

Thanh

[bcsscott]

WHAT A JOKE!! YOU GOT IT RIGHT ON HERE!! The Thai's bring in foreigners to setup their networks AND ADVISE THEM ON A BUDGET ON MAINTENENCE AND UPGRADES for their infrastructure and CUSTOMER base expansion.

What do they do? Spend ALL the money on promotion and advertising or just pocket it!! They spend nothing on the INFENSTUCTURE!!! Then when they have a problem it’s “sorry sir it’s hab a big AIS problem, sorry sir the post office hab problem, sorry sir it’s the elephant that stepped on the thingie and make it bad problem”

In Thailand the bottom line is MONEY! Not CUSTOMER SERVICE!!! Until the Thai’s realize that they must invest, or just make an effort at customer service, being a lot more honest with their CUSTOMERS and thinking just a little bit into the future, then this is going to be a consistent problem that is not going to go away.

A VERY PISSED OFF DTAC BUSINESS CUSTOMER!!

Just amazed that they would wait until they had such a problem and try to fix it afterwards.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[samran]

The Government here should legislate, the same as the Aussie goverment did a few years ago, to force carriers to 'port' your mobile phone number to another carrier / mobile phone carrier service if the user of that number requests it.

Once phone companies had no hold over you (by your having to stay with one carrier, just to maintain your phone number) and you were allowed to transfer your existing number to any phone company, competition (and thus service levels) hotted up as phone companies had to figure out other ways to stop the 'churning' of numbers and keep their client base.

Portability of your phone number to another phone company here in Thailand would force a similar response from local carriers. It then becomes more of an issue of service rather than just price of the calls. A cheap call rate is useless if you can't get through!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Iang,

A couple of years ago there was a proposal to introduce number portablility, however the government (ie read AIS) said that it wasn't necessary.

You have to understand that Thaksin wants a monopoly and does not like competition. He does his best not to allow DTAC and Orange either easily bring on new customers. Number portability was introduced in Australia partly because Australia has a very strong telecomunications regulator whos job it is to promote what ever needs to be done in the interests of the consumer.

The Thai government (read AIS again), while having similar laws on the books does not particularly like to let anyone enforce them, lest it lead to any disadvantage of Mr Thaksins business interests.

Edited June 14, 2005 by samran

[udon]

WHAT A JOKE!! YOU GOT IT RIGHT ON HERE!! The Thai's bring in foreigners to setup their networks AND ADVISE THEM ON A BUDGET ON MAINTENENCE AND UPGRADES for their infrastructure and CUSTOMER base expansion.

What do they do? Spend ALL the money on promotion and advertising or just pocket it!! They spend nothing on the INFENSTUCTURE!!! Then when they have a problem it’s “sorry sir it’s hab a big AIS problem, sorry sir the post office hab problem, sorry sir it’s the elephant that stepped on the thingie and make it bad problem”

In Thailand the bottom line is MONEY! Not CUSTOMER SERVICE!!! Until the Thai’s realize that they must invest, or just make an effort at customer service, being a lot more honest with their CUSTOMERS and thinking just a little bit into the future, then this is going to be a consistent problem that is not going to go away. 

A VERY PISSED OFF DTAC BUSINESS CUSTOMER!!

Just amazed that they would wait until they had such a problem and try to fix it afterwards.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Pls turn off your caps lock when posting, we are all capable of reading normal lower case words & sentences.

[sriracha john]

The Government here should legislate, the same as the Aussie goverment did a few years ago, to force carriers to 'port' your mobile phone number to another carrier / mobile phone carrier service if the user of that number requests it.

Once phone companies had no hold over you (by your having to stay with one carrier, just to maintain your phone number) and you were allowed to transfer your existing number to any phone company, competition (and thus service levels) hotted up as phone companies had to figure out other ways to stop the 'churning' of numbers and keep their client base.

Portability of your phone number to another phone company here in Thailand would force a similar response from local carriers. It then becomes more of an issue of service rather than just price of the calls. A cheap call rate is useless if you can't get through!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Iang,

A couple of years ago there was a proposal to introduce number portablility, however the government (ie read AIS) said that it wasn't necessary.

You have to understand that Thaksin wants a monopoly and does not like competition. He does his best not to allow DTAC and Orange either easily bring on new customers. Number portability was introduced in Australia partly because Australia has a very strong telecomunications regulator whos job it is to promote what ever needs to be done in the interests of the consumer.

The Thai government (read AIS again), while having similar laws on the books does not particularly like to let anyone enforce them, lest it lead to any disadvantage of Mr Thaksins business interests.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Precisely, samran. That is also why Thailand is still waiting for the formation of NTC (Nat. Telecom Commission) after YEARS of wrangling and "negotiations."

[sriracha john]

And in a related development in case you need any further reasons to avoid AIS:

Bloomberg News

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 15, 2005

BANGKOK Advanced Info Service, Thailand's biggest cellphone operator, said Tuesday that a price war that had reduced call rates to as low as 0.25 baht was ending as the company withdrew an aggressive promotion to raise profit.

"Cutting prices, if it continues without stopping, will hurt everyone," the company's chief executive, Somprasong Boonyachai, said in a televised interview in Bangkok. The company considered that price cuts had gone far beyond sustainability, "so we intervened and now I think the price-cutting game has stopped," he said.

Thai cellphone companies have been offering promotions and cutting rates to attract customers in a country where about 40 percent of the 65 million people have handsets.

Advanced Info, the last among the country's three biggest mobile phone companies to reduce call rates, attracted 150,000 subscribers in a week when it slashed prices on May 9, after losing market share for two consecutive months to its cheaper rivals.

The promotion ended last week and advertising campaigns were now focusing on extra services rather than price, he said.

"Everybody can see at 0.25 baht per minute the company cannot survive," he said. "It's constructive competition that I would like to see."

Advanced Info said on June 3 that it had signed up 30 percent fewer subscribers in April than in March because of price cuts by rivals and slower growth in the industry.

Advanced Info added 72,300 users in April, compared with 103,300 a month earlier, it said. TA Orange, the country's third-largest wireless operator, added 100,340 subscribers, while Total Access Communications, the second-largest operator, signed up 143,891 customers in the month.

About 86 percent of Advanced Info's 15.6 million subscribers use pre-paid calling cards. Advanced Info said average revenue per pre-paid user fell to 325 baht, or $8, in April from 329 baht a month earlier.

Thailand's rapid uptake of mobile phones had left the network unable to cope with demand at times, causing service disconnections, Somprasong said, adding that the situation worsened during promotions and price wars.

A combination of high fuel prices, drought, the Dec. 26 tsunami and sectarian violence in southern Thailand has resulted in a lowering of economic growth forecasts and a near-record current account deficit, while sending consumer confidence to a three-year low.

"The cycle could affect us," Somprasong said, "but so far it's still okay.

"The cost that the consumer pays to have a communication service is pretty low in Thailand, so I think the sensitivity is small." "In fact, it's almost as small as our corporate sensitivity to our customers' needs or any of their problems or concerns."

[george]

Update:

AIS will expand direct gateways

BANGKOK: -- A giant billboard promotes a new promotional package by AIS. Local mobile phone operators have been engaged in a bitter fight over network links that has resulted in severe dificulties for users attempting to complete calls across different networks. — Apichart Jinakul

Bowing to the mounting frustration of mobile phone users' inability to complete calls, market leader Advanced Info Service (AIS) has reversed its decision to shut down direct, cross-network gateways it claimed would be redundant once state-owned TOT Corporation expanded access.

AIS chairman Somprasong Boonyachai said the company, ''in the interest of consumers'', would keep open direct connections with DTAC, the second biggest mobile network, No 3 TA Orange and TT&T, which operates fixed-line services to provinces outside Bangkok.

In addition, he said AIS would expand its own direct channels to the other mobile firms, known as interconnection links. Such links are necessary so that callers who subscribe to services by one network can call subscribers of other companies.

Mr Somprasong said AIS was on the verge of expanding existing direct interconnection channels to accommodate surging traffic. The network expansion would cost ''several hundreds of million baht.''

But he warned the expansion would take time, since individual adjustments would be needed to 10,000 base stations. Currently, he said, AIS had 500 interconnection gateways to DTAC, 200 to TA Orange and 100 to TT&T. Another 1,600 circuit cards directly link AIS and TOT.

During the past three to four months, complaints from subscribers to non-AIS services have risen sharply over uncompleted calls. Mr Somprasong said yesterday there had been a sudden sharp increase in mobile traffic, jamming the previously efficient interconnection gateways.

''We never had any intention of blocking any operators as we have been accused of doing,'' he said. ''Revenue from mobile phone services comes largely from customers making calls.''

The denial echoed similar recent statements from AIS, but have failed to stop loud and public rumours that AIS was intentionally blocking calls as part of an unfair attempt to battle competition. Even executives of other companies have publicly brought up the speculation.

Mr Somprasong said 48% of Thais would subscribe to a mobile service by the end of the year, fuelled by new industries in community areas.

He expressed confidence that the proposed telecoms master plan of the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) will lead current operators to apply new operating licences, and simply let their concession agreements with the state-owned firms expire.

New licences would enable current operators to build their own new networks and migrate their customers to new firms that would not have to pay fees to TOT or CAT Telecom.

--TNA 2005-06-15

[udon]

You would have to prise DTAC from my cold dead hand.

AIS .......... Never!

[wimster]

Have a postpaid AIS and my wife a postpaid DTac. Obviously had many network down problems, can't dial out, drop outs etc. etc.

Finally got a supervisor of AIS customer service (dial 1175) on the phone yesterday, after the representative lied to me stating that it was all the other networks fault due to cheap pricing.

She told me:

1) "Some of the problems will be fixed before the end of the year" (according to what she heard from the technical department). She could not give me more details.

2) "All techincal difficulties finished the end of the year". (Which year ?!)

3) She offered me a 30% discount (on the subscription amount, 1000 THB p.m in my case) for this month, and she will call me every month to check the service. I told her that if the service continues to be this bad, I would need to extended.

I have her name, so you bet I'll stay on the case.

Told me wife to call DTac and ask the same.

Question is when number portabillity will be finally introduced, so you can tell a bad network goodbye after no service...

Update:

AIS will expand direct gateways

BANGKOK: -- A giant billboard promotes a new promotional package by AIS. Local mobile phone operators have been engaged in a bitter fight over network links that has resulted in severe dificulties for users attempting to complete calls across different networks. — Apichart Jinakul 

Bowing to the mounting frustration of mobile phone users' inability to complete calls, market leader Advanced Info Service (AIS) has reversed its decision to shut down direct, cross-network gateways it claimed would be redundant once state-owned TOT Corporation expanded access.

AIS chairman Somprasong Boonyachai said the company, ''in the interest of consumers'', would keep open direct connections with DTAC, the second biggest mobile network, No 3 TA Orange and TT&T, which operates fixed-line services to provinces outside Bangkok.

In addition, he said AIS would expand its own direct channels to the other mobile firms, known as interconnection links. Such links are necessary so that callers who subscribe to services by one network can call subscribers of other companies.

Mr Somprasong said AIS was on the verge of expanding existing direct interconnection channels to accommodate surging traffic. The network expansion would cost ''several hundreds of million baht.''

But he warned the expansion would take time, since individual adjustments would be needed to 10,000 base stations. Currently, he said, AIS had 500 interconnection gateways to DTAC, 200 to TA Orange and 100 to TT&T. Another 1,600 circuit cards directly link AIS and TOT.

During the past three to four months, complaints from subscribers to non-AIS services have risen sharply over uncompleted calls. Mr Somprasong said yesterday there had been a sudden sharp increase in mobile traffic, jamming the previously efficient interconnection gateways.

''We never had any intention of blocking any operators as we have been accused of doing,'' he said. ''Revenue from mobile phone services comes largely from customers making calls.''

The denial echoed similar recent statements from AIS, but have failed to stop loud and public rumours that AIS was intentionally blocking calls as part of an unfair attempt to battle competition. Even executives of other companies have publicly brought up the speculation.

Mr Somprasong said 48% of Thais would subscribe to a mobile service by the end of the year, fuelled by new industries in community areas.

He expressed confidence that the proposed telecoms master plan of the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) will lead current operators to apply new operating licences, and simply let their concession agreements with the state-owned firms expire.

New licences would enable current operators to build their own new networks and migrate their customers to new firms that would not have to pay fees to TOT or CAT Telecom.

--TNA 2005-06-15

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[george]

AIS set to open new mobile phone network connections

BANGKOK: -- Mobile calls should start getting more connected today, as market leader Advanced Info Service (AIS) opens its first set of 100 new circuit cards to connect with TOT and from one network reach subscribers of other phone companies.

Wichien Mektrakarn, AIS executive vice-president for operations, said the rest of a planned 960 new interconnection gateways through TOT will be finished soon _ 400 within two weeks and the rest by next month.

The 100 circuit cards to be opened today can handle 6,000 cross-network calls simultaneously. Once the expansion is completed in about six weeks, the phone grid will have added the capability for an additional 115,200 calls simultaneously.

TOT authorities asked AIS to install an additional 960 digital trunk interconnect points to their gateways, while the second biggest firm DTAC added 700 points and No 3 company TA Orange put in 480.

Before the urgent expansion, AIS and TOT had 1,700 circuit cards linked directly with each other, with a total capacity of 213,780 cross-network calls at the same time.

AIS also has direct interconnection gateways with 530 circuits cards with DTAC having capacity to handle 63,600 calls.

But all this has been woefully unable to handle demand. At peak hours, a majority of calls from DTAC to AIS were claimed to be failed or dropped. Yesterday, Mr Wichien gave no guarantee that the company's 200-million-baht network expansion to TOT will eliminate traffic problems. He said AIS would increase its switching capacity and base stations if the problem persists after next month.

He said mobile cross-network congestion started on June 6 during the peak evening call hours of 6 and 9 pm. Traffic problems have been severe ever since, and are worst from 5 to 10 pm.

Subscribers and the media have criticised AIS but Mr Wichien said his company is also feeling the pinch, since it introduced promotional phone rates to fight for market with other companies. He estimated the success rate of connections by AIS callers has dropped from 90% to 60% this month.

DTAC estimated its customers were completing just 50% of peak-hour calls, while TA Orange successes fell to 47%. AIS has blamed promotions which have dropped the price of phone calls for a surge in telephone calls that has caught the entire industry unprepared.

''We faced similar serious problems, but we never blame anyone [else], since we learned that heavy pricing promotions cause traffic to increase, with mobile phone users making calls at an average of six minutes per call, compared with the average of two minutes previously,'' he said.

Mr Wichien called the matching-promotion strategy of operators a ''zero-sum game'', in which no one is gaining. Operators' own networks were jammed with calls from customer to customer, and many of those were also incomplete.

The congestion problem could serve as a lesson for operators. If smaller rivals want to continue their pricing promotions, AIS is ready to fight to the end and let the market decide who survives.

--Bangkok Post 2005-06-17

[george]

Competition in call rate promotion tends to ease: KRC

BANGKOK: -- Mobile phone operators will ease stiff competition in the call rate promotion and turn to focus on service quality and supplementary services, according to Kasikornthai Research Center.

The leading think tank reported competition in the mobile phone market had markedly intensified in the first half of this year with many operators offering a call rate at the lowest of 0.25 baht per minute.

It resulted in traffic congestion in the phone communication and poor efficiency for a call in different networks since a signal channel of each operator could not accommodate the steep increase in phone calls particularly in rush hours.

In the first four months of this year, the number of mobile phone users had increased by 18.75% to 28.5 million from that of the same period of last year. Of this, 83% are pre-paid phones and the remaining 17% post-paid phones.

However, the period of the call rate promotion is due to expire and phone operators tend to ease the competition in the second half of this year by turning from the price war to focusing on the network quality with the introduction of various supplementary services.

KRC believed the signal quality problem would be addressed in the second half if each operator managed to increase the signal channel as planned.

Overall, it viewed, the mobile phone market would be moderately affected by the economic slowdown in the second half of the year.

Although the mobile phone plays more important role in daily living, not a few use it in an unnecessary way.

Under the current economic downturn, consumers are likely to reduce the phone use to save costs, which will be another risk factors to the business in addition to stiff competition among operators, according to KRC.

--TNA 2005-07-11

[Sphere]

True to form related to their technological issues, it would seem that the AIS GSM signal does not fully support my Windows based mobile phone either! Once my phone (purchased at Telewiz) goes out of range, I have to reboot it to relocate the AIS signal. It works fine in other countries!

I have talked to AIS service staff and on their advice [1] given the phone in for "repairs" and [2] changed the SIM card (paid for a new one). Final diagnosis from AIS - Mai roo kreung pen arai!

That's what you have when you use 20th century technology to run a 21st century business!