The whole nine yards
Emtel goes the whole nine yards
FOREGOING all recommendations, I subscribed to Emtel when I needed a mobile phone in Mauritius last November. Many criticised my choice, citing Emtel’s poor customer service and inadequate coverage in some areas when compared to CellPlus’s. First, on principle, I wanted to favour the “little guy”. And second, I believed Emtel was more innovative than the competition.
In Mauritius again in February, I was reassured of my earlier decision whenever Emtel’s affordable mobile Internet service made it possible for me to continue working remotely when the expensive and unreliable ADSL connection from Telecom Plus became unusable. Had there not been the flexible tariffs that Emtel offered, tele-work would have been impossible.
Today’s news about Emtel’s plans to deploy a fibre optic cable network across Mauritius and to have their own international connection through an undersea cable, which would make them independent of Mauritius Telecom-controlled SAFE, confirms their drive for innovation. Not only are they aiming to lower Internet prices for Mauritians, but they also have the bigger ambition of matching the prices of ISPs in Europe.
« Notre objectif est de pouvoir offrir la même vitesse de bande passante et au même prix qu’à l’étranger », Shyam Roy, directeur général d’Emtel [...]
« Ce n’est pas possible qu’un pays qui se dit être une cyber-île ne peut offrir une connexion à 8 mégabits à ses internautes. »
While Orange (ex-Telecom Plus) are trying to cut corners with such gimmicks as Fair Use Policy and monthly download caps, Emtel is bent on serving their customers as best as possible. To achieve this, they are not making any concession.
Eddy.
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Powered by WordPress and Eddy Young.
Its always good and encouraging to go for the little guy and for innovation but my experience with the little guy(still and growing smaller) Nomad was quite disastrous!
I am sure Emtel is more innovative koz i have even an emtel sim, but rarely makes use of it.
Comment by Yashvin — Friday, 23 May 2008 02:52 GMT #
Emtel was first to bring the Motorola brick phones to Mauritius. Quite a feat!
Comment by S — Friday, 23 May 2008 03:29 GMT #
TRUE, being the first to launch mobile services under the nose of Mauritius Telecom is quite an achievement.
Eddy.
Comment by Eddy — Friday, 23 May 2008 09:05 GMT #
I’ve been using an Emtel sim since a couple of months, mainly because it allows me to use the 3.5G connection while being a Prepaid customer, which for some unknown reason I haven’t been able to do on Orange. The mobile web for Orange is also way slower and actually much more expensive than that offered by Emtel.
I’ve been using the Emtel 3.5G on a Windows Mobile platform device and till now I haven’t been having any problems – the service has always been fast and reliable.
Way to go Emtel :)
Comment by LaSh — Friday, 23 May 2008 10:13 GMT #
@LaSh: I also found that Orange 3G was slower and more expensive than Emtel 3G.
FWIW, mobile Internet service on pre-paid accounts was quite rare even in the UK until recently. So, we can say that Emtel is on the forefront of mobile Internet selling.
Eddy.
Comment by Eddy — Friday, 23 May 2008 10:41 GMT #
Orange 3G? The last time I tried to connect to Orange using UMTS, I couln’t – it’s like the service is switched off.
But you can connect perfectly using EDGE – so actually “Orange 3G” is still EDGE! pfffff
As for Emtel, 3G is limited to 128kbps for prepay users i think? It’s only when you subscribe to one of the packages that you get full speed… :P
Emtel 3G is certainly much cheaper than Orange – I once did parallel testing, loading same pages & Orange billed me twice more! :(
I think we should all support Emtel for this wonderful initiative! :D At least Emtel is a company working towards the advancement of Internet users & not making us time-travel backwards like Orange with the FUP.
Comment by carrotmadman6 — Friday, 23 May 2008 12:44 GMT #
@carrotmadman6: ACTUALLY, I am no longer sure whether it was 3G or something else, but it was supposed to be one of the “fast” connections.
Eddy.
Comment by Eddy — Friday, 23 May 2008 13:00 GMT #
Emtel still has some shortcomings regarding its customer service. A colleague of mine registered her sim card earlier during the week. To her dismay, all her outgoing calls were still barred. When customer service was called, the agent on the phone suggested to switch sim card on another phone. Same denial. She then called customer service again. This time the agent told her to switch off her phone for 30mins and switched it one again. In the meantime, i suppose Emtel has been activating her sim card for she has been able to make calls later on. Nine yards ahead with poor customer service indeed!!!
Comment by Clive — Friday, 23 May 2008 17:56 GMT #
@ Clive – I’ll have to disagree there, I for one enjoyed the customer service of Emtel, I went to their Customer Centres twice, once at Jumbo Phoenix and the other at NHDC Rose-Hill, to have my device properly set up for surfing – actually twice because I switched devices – I received an EXCELLENT service from my point of view. So I’ll guess it’s may be a question of luck may be of who you get to serve you.
@ carrotmadman – I THINK it’s much faster than 128k, anyway that’s how it feels for me, even pages with pictures and animations load at very fast speed.
Comment by LaSh — Friday, 23 May 2008 18:32 GMT #
THE FEW times I had to deal with Emtel customer service, the experience was very good always.
When I had to set up the HSDPA modem on Mac OS X, it was more about me showing them how to do it rather than the opposite, but the willingness of the agents to help were reassuring. Their showroom in Port-Louis can be very busy, but once you are in front of an agent, you are certain to get their full attention.
Sometimes activation commands do not go through. I have the same thing happening to me whenever I need a service activated, be it my credit card or a new SIM. A more telling sign of good customer service is how they respond to customer grievances.
Eddy.
Comment by Eddy — Friday, 23 May 2008 18:33 GMT #