Telcos must communicate better with customers

ALL content used in this not-for-profit blog remain the property of their respective owners.
http://www.straitstimes.com/premium/forum-letters/story/telcos-must-communicate-better-customers-20131223

Many mobile phone users like me recently experienced difficulty in sending and receiving text messages, and were unaware that there was a three-hour disruption ("SingTel users hit by SMS outage"; last Wednesday).

SingTel, as well as the other telcos, needs to be able to communicate better with customers.

Telcos should take the initiative to alert its customers quickly in cases of emergency, outages or the maintenance of networks.

They can make use of media such as Facebook, e-mail, hotline or automated SMS system to notify customers, assure them that they are doing their best to rectify the problem and inform them of possible solutions available.

An estimated time frame should be given to let customers know when the services would be fully restored.

I urge SingTel to compensate customers affected by the outage with vouchers as a sign of goodwill.

Consumer feedback is another area that SingTel can look at to avoid a repeat of the same incident. Regular maintenance checks also need to be carried out to ensure there are little or no disruptions.

Better communication methods and feedback channels need to be explored and implemented so customers are informed of the situation by the telco itself.

Third parties should not be the ones spreading the news.

I hope that telcos can do their part in ensuring that information is passed down efficiently and in a timely manner.

Darren Chan Keng Leong