Posted by This Day Online on
Nigerian GSM subscribers have besieged Globacom Customer Care Department, phone calls and visitors making enquiries about the network's newly introduced prepaid roaming service.
Nigerian GSM subscribers have besieged Globacom Customer Care Department, phone calls and visitors making enquiries about the network's newly introduced prepaid roaming service. With the service, subscribers on prepaid platform who travel abroad for business or leisure are able to make and receive calls on their phones. This is the first time any network in Nigeria is opening up opportunities for prepaid subscribers to roam.
Reports from the customer care section indicate that subscribers are excited about the new service which enables them to use their existing prepaid lines to roam, thereby keeping them in touch with their kiths and kin wherever they go. "What is of immense benefit to me particularly is that I can still use my line wherever I go in the World", Mr. Keneth Eze, a trader in Alaba said.
According to a chief executive of a computer firm company in Lagos, many people think that big executives like me do not use prepaid lines. Any executive who wants to be conscious of his telephone budget prefers to use a prepaid line. "Your secretary does the scratching and loading but you are conscious of your expenses. You simply tell her do not allow me to exceed N30,000 naira and it is easy to control
"It now becomes more interesting when I can do all those things that I would only have been able to do with a post paid line," he said.
For Mrs Ugochi Essom, it was a miracle. When I heard about it through one of my brothers, I loaded my phone and informed the network that I would love to be roamed. I don't think I had the full confidence.
But like many things in life, seeing is believing. I received a call while in London that changed my business. One of many customers called me and when I told him that I was in London, the man was excited and started making orders for goods right on the phone. Frankly speaking, Glo has indeed changed my life. I was doing business in Nigeria, right there in Dubai", she said.
It was the same story for Miss Tolu Ogedengbe. She had travelled to Britain on a business trip but was in touch with her customers in Nigeria and they were in touch with me. "My brother, let me tell you the truth, telephone has changed the way we do things in Nigeria and I commend Globacom for leading this revolution", she said.
For Mallam Carara Amodu, "Gone are the days when you travel and leave your business behind. We now travel with our business. If the government can do what it has done in telecommunication with energy, I can convincingly tell you that we have indeed laid the foundation for development. We are still not there yet", he said.
Only recently, Glo Gateway Chief Operating Officer, Ashok Israni, told journalists in Lagos that the network is offering CAMEL (Customized Application for Mobile Enhanced Logic) phase 2 roaming which is the latest innovation in prepaid roaming.
CAMEL is superior to the one way roaming where customers can only receive calls through the USSD roaming obtainable in some other African countries.
CAMEL phase 2 enables the prepaid customer to make and receive calls as well as receive text messages while roaming outside Nigeria. Glo Mobile has thus not only become the first network in Nigeria to launch commercial prepaid roaming, but it is also the first to introduce the CAMEL phase 2 roaming in the country.
To enjoy the service, Israni explained, a Glo Mobile prepaid customer simply recharges his account and calls Glo Customer Care or visits any Gloworld shop to get the roaming service activated. "Thereafter, the subscriber can proceed to his destination where he can make and receive local and international calls as well as receive text messages," he added.
The Glo Mobile prepaid subscriber is thus able to maintain the same number when he travels abroad. "The subscriber is able to stay in touch with friends, family and business associates back home and the service offers users unimaginably crisp and clear calls. The quality of service makes him feel as if he is next door even when he is thousands of kilometers away," Israni said.
Other benefits of the service include the subscriber's ability to control his usage since it is a prepaid service and the fact that he is not required to make any deposits or fill out any documentation to enjoy the service as is the case with postpaid roaming. In addition to these advantages, there are no complexities involved. The customer simply recharges by loading the normal prepaid card which is easily available. He is also saved the inconvenience of sending new phone numbers to friends and associates in Nigeria.
The customer can also recharge the account in the foreign network he is roaming into as if he would recharge his Glo mobile line in Nigeria by dialing *123* secret code followed by key.