Dtac Fined Bt10Mn For Service Failure

[Mod]

Dtac Fined Bt10Mn For Service Failure

BANGKOK: -- Total Access Communication Plc (Dtac) solemnly accepts the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission's Bt10 million fine, for the mishap that affected 20 per cent of its clients.

It marks the first time that a mobile phone operator is fined for service failure. NBTC started operations less than a year ago.

At a press conference organised by the NBTC, Dtac CEO Jon Eddy Abdullah said that dtac is willing to accept the fine for failure to comply with Section 33 of the Telecommunications Business Act. Dtac earlier provided free calls to over 3 million customers affected by the 65-minute service interruption on August 28. Dtac now has 24 million customers.

Abdullah said Dtac would not challenge the NBTC’s decision.

He said that the service interruption was caused by the malfunction of a pair of MPLS Signaling Server was brought about by a technician from a sub-contractor who performed activities on Dtac equipment at the Rangsit Switching Center without proper authorisation.

"We have agreed to accept the fine without any challenge in order to show responsibility to our customers and telecom regulators for letting them down. The most recent incident was particularly disappointing since it was the result of a human error by a technician hired by one of our sub-contractors, which has nothing to do with the solid and high quality network that we have," said Abdullah.

"We do not make excuses. And, this is why we moved quickly to provide compensation to our customers immediately after the incident. Thus far, we have provided compensation to over 3 million customers, at a value of over Bt100 million. And, we estimated that this value could go as high as Bt300 million by the end of next week. We are doing this despite our estimate that only about 1.6 million, out of the total daily user of 4.8 million customers, were directly affected," he explained.

"Although dtac experienced a number of service interruptions since last December, this is not to be viewed as a pattern. Only the incident last December was linked to the equipment in our network. The rest were either fibre cuts or an error caused by an external technician. We are confident about the high quality of our network and service and the high competence of our hard working people. We will put in place additional preventive measures and control on top of the very stringent processes and procedures that we already have, to ensure that they are strictly observed and followed. Most importantly, we will commit ourselves to working harder to win back the confidence of our customers," Abdullah concluded.

The Nation 2012-09-05