Tanzania: Ministry issues three-months ultimatum to address overcharge issues

To deal with rising complaints against mobile phone companies in Tanzania that are allegedly robbing customers of airtime and Internet bundle charges the communication ministry has issued a three-month ultimatum, according to a report by Daily News.

Reportedly, Faustine Ndugulile, the Communication and Information Technology Minister has administered the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) to end the following complaints in three months. The issue was released earlier on Monday in Dar es Salaam, in his TCRA familiarisation tour, in which Ndugulile said that TCRA should address the public complaints of being overcharged on airtime bundles and Internet, as per the report.

He mentioned the need for a system that would verify the amount paid by a customer for that to the real cost of communication, also toll-free number(s) to verify the submitted complaints. Led by the directives issued to TCRA Consumer Consultative Council (CCC) by the ministry on such complaints, it stressed that the authorities would emerge with better decisions on the matter. Ndugulile added, "Tanzanians are not ignorant, they want to see the value for their money spent on internet and airtime bundles".

As reported there has been a lot of complaints registered on the offered packages by telecom operators and so Ngugulile focused to emerge with long-lasting ways sooner.

However, according to Research ICT Africa Internet's report, Tanzania is the only country in East Africa that offers the cheapest data charges in the region in the African continent with leading with 4,950.52, followed by Rwanda, Kenya, Uganda, and Burundi, as of 2019, September.

Adding to the issue, James Kilaba, the Director General of TCRA acknowledged the shortcomings of the bandwidth and packaging.