Trinidad and Tobago's TSTT says that it plans to spend half of a billion dollars to ensure its GSM network provides island-wide coverage and better services. Michael Wayne, TSTT's Mobile Services Marketing Manager disclosed this when he appeared last week on GAYELLE TV's "On Guard" program hosted by Marcia Henville. Mr. Wayne said TSTT's goal was to build Trinidad and Tobago's biggest and best GSM network rivalling any competitor entering the market.
According to Mr. Wayne, TSTT has been continuously expanding the GSM network since its launch in 2003 and extensive work was in progress at present which would give customers continuous improvements in the quality of service over the next six months.
In addition to the network improvements, Mr. Wayne said TSTT is also implementing a new billing system, expanding GPRS coverage, content and multimedia services, International SMS and roaming services for pre-paid and GPRS users. In response to concerns about the cost of roaming services, Wayne explained that a roaming call generated international charges as well as foreign airtime charges and foreign taxes that were payable to overseas administrations. "Much of what a customer sees on their bill for roaming charges is in fact paid out to these overseas administrations."
Asked about problems with dropped calls or no signal as reported by customers, Wayne stated that TSTT was addressing these issues. He said TSTT has been adding more cell sites to the network, three of which had been added just in the last month. The capacity of individual cell sites to handle more calls was also increased. "Getting the coverage and reliability up to what customers expect is a number one priority. Expanding the network will in turn support our deployment of the international SMS, multi media and content services we plan to introduce."
Posted to the site on 10th January 2005
Posted to: www.cellular-news.com/story/11638.php