65% of Pakistanis Dissatisfied with Cellular Network Performance – Here’s Why?

Recently, we conducted a poll on our social media channels to get a view of the general public regarding the performance of cellular networks in Pakistan. Astonishingly, around 65% of the people in the two polls expressed dissatisfaction about the performance of their respective networks. The polls were conducted on the Facebook and Instagram channels of Phoneworld as you can see in the given image.

 

These polls show that the majority of the people in Pakistan aren’t satisfied with the performance of their cellular networks.

Reasons Behind the Dismal Cellular Network Performance:

In our point of view, the reason behind the dismal performance of cellular networks can be attributed to the greater number of users and less number of BTS (base transceiver stations). A senior industry expert told us that GSM BTS capacity varies with technology. A single 2G BTS supports dozens to hundreds of calls and limited data. 3G handles more users and offers better data speeds. 4G BTS handles hundreds to over a thousand users, with higher data rates. 5G BTS can serve thousands concurrently.

Actual capacity depends on factors like spectrum and network design, often involving multiple BTSs for optimal coverage and capacity. If a single BTS is responsible for serving too many UEs, it can become overloaded, leading to degraded performance, slower data speeds, dropped calls, and decreased quality of service for users.

What role can the PTA Play?

Our national telecom regulator Pakistan Telecommunication Authority should take stringent action against telcos (Jazz, Ufone, Zong, Telenor) for providing poor network performance. It should penalize the telcos who aren’t providing optimal cellular services. Furthermore, the telecom regulator should also urge the telcos to install more BTS to improve the performance of cellular networks.

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