Businesses Failing to Control WiFi Hotspot Usage

Wireless hotspot users are not getting value for money for service access as they are wasting minutes unnecessarily, according to the wireless hotspot access provider, Trustive. There seems to be a real opportunity for cellphone providers to tap into the converged billing market and enable customers to charge their WiFi usage to their cellphone account on a per-usage basis.

Bram Jan Streefland, managing director and co-founder of Trustive, says: "The survey shows that many end users are paying excessively on a per minute basis. Around 60 per cent are opting for ad hoc methods of purchasing wireless services such as scratch cards or vouchers, which are often sold in hour-long blocks. With just over half of end users averaging a session times of 30 minutes or less, it means that about half of the time purchased is wasted and users are unnecessarily losing unused minutes"

Currently, 45 per cent of operator revenues come from voucher and credit card payments compared to 32 per cent from subscriptions, a figure which has risen from 28 per cent in 2006.

Streefland says: "We anticipate that subscription levels will continue to grow over the next 12-18 months. For end users the three most important things when purchasing subscription schemes are coverage, price and easy connectivity. Certainly the first and third are improving dramatically as the number of hotspots, aggregators and roaming agreements grow and client software becomes available like our HotSpotter with its easy one-click access. It is interesting to note that for pre-paid services, end users are saying that price, validity period and minimum spend are more important than quality of service. This may mean that there is little impetus for operators to provide quality service to those customers, which is a concern. It is also interesting that 65 per cent of users would ideally like a free service, but they also want to connect easily via a fast well secured connection. Beggars can't be choosers!"

Off the business radar

The majority - 85 per cent - of respondents control the purse strings themselves when it comes to hotspot use, rather than their place of employment. This is despite the fact that 60 per cent use wireless hotspots to access their work's intranet or the corporate network.

"It is not surprising that we are seeing costs for Wi-Fi getting out of control for some companies. They have employees out on the road or at airports buying expensive ad hoc services and then coming back with a fistful of receipts. It makes cost control and transparency virtually impossible. Organisations also get people using company laptops at hotspots and operating outside of the business IT policy. This obviously has implications," continues Streefland.

Keeping up-to-date when on the move and increasing productivity are seen as the two biggest benefits of hotspot access at 30 per cent and 25 per cent respectively.

Roaming all over the world

The report suggests that end-users want hotspot connectivity wherever they are. The results show 33 per cent use hotspots all over the world, 37 per cent nationally, and 30 per cent close to home. The three most popular places to use Wi-Fi hotspots are bars or caf

Posted to the site on 25th May 2007