SIM registration: Knocks for MTN

As MTN continues to register SIM cards to upgrade data of subscribers in Abuja, many of them, on Friday, expressed disappointment with the ‘shoddy’ preparation for the exercise, calling on the network provider to find a better way of upgrading its database.
MTN started another round of SIM cards registration in the country, following a fine imposed on it by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) for having 1.5 million unregistered SIMs in its network.
In some satellite towns in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) on Friday, there were the usual large crowd at registration centres as many subscribers went to join the queues as early as 4.a.m.
At the Lugbe MTN outlet, some of the subscribers urged the company to find a better way of upgrading the database of customers.
Mr Michael Chucks, a medical practitioner, urged MTN to be a little more organised to avoid making masses suffer unnecessarily for other people’s mistakes.
According to him, the standards should be set and clearly stated.
“Setting regular standards and not changing them constantly is what we need, especially in the upgrade of data on subscribers,’’ he said.
Mr Adebanji Joel, a civil servant in Lugbe said that he came in response to the text message he got from MTN to update his SIM card.
“It is not convenient and it is very risky gathering crowd like this outside as anybody can just come with a gun and open fire, so they should consider a better way of doing this,’’ he said.
According to him, he came on Thursday and saw the crowd, and decided to go back home “to return this morning”.
He said that although he came around 6.30 a.m., he found himself to be number 97 on the list, adding that some people came as early as 4.30a.m.
“It very difficult and it is a strenuous exercise, people left their homes early just to update their database, about four months ago, I got the same text from MTN to come for the same process.
“Before I could come for the revalidation, my Internet data was blocked and it took them seven days to restore it.
“Four months later, they are sending me another text message so what happened to my data base, what happened to the ones I did before? I did not do it by the roadside; I did it in MTN office.
Mr Kingsley Ezeh, a businessman said he came to the centre about 7.a.m. to meet the crowd, adding that MTN should look for an organised way of updating its database.
“When the customer care called me I suggested that it was better for subscribers to come with their passports and scan them instead of complains of passports not being clear.
“Most of the people left their places of work and business to register their SIM cards and some might lose their jobs in the process.
Mike Adejube, a resident of Lugbe, expressed dissatisfaction with the process, adding that the message sent on compensation of N5, 000, 10,000 and so on “is a deceit’’.
He said that he believed that it was because of the message that a lot of people came out to register.
“MTN is deceiving us, look at the crowd here and this is not good and this kind of situation can be a target for the terrorists,’’ he said.
In Gwarinpa MTN outlet, it was the same situation as subscribers complained of the hardship they faced to register their SIMs.
Mr Ibrahim Bello, a cyber café owner, decried the slow pace of the registration process.
Bello said that most times the computers failed to work leaving subscribers stranded for hours.
“I have been coming here for the past three days just to register my SIM and I have not been able to do that; today makes it the third day of queuing to register.
“I usually get tired of waiting, so I go home from time to time then return to check on the queue because of the nature of my business.’’
Mrs Joy Amos, a housewife, said that she had to wake up as early as 4 a.m. to set her house in order before coming for her SIM registration to be able to wait long enough for the registration.
Amos said that the MTN staff were few, so it took a longer time for subscribers to get registered.
Mr Zong Kefas, a civil servant, said that though the process of registration was not hard but the long queue was making it difficult for people to register with ease.
“The process is very stressful, especially in Gwarinpa here, you won’t believe that people came here as early as 6.a.m. just so they can be among the first to be registered; this is crazy.’’
Kefas however said that he would suspend his SIM card registration for now until MTN mapped out more organised way to tackle the situation.
The registration is expected to continue for months to ensure that many subscribers are properly captured in the MTN database as required by the NCC.