MNP in INDIA Delayed | Mobile Number Portability | By July

MNP is implemented in different ways across the globe. The international and European standard is for a customer wishing to port his/her number to contact the new provider (Recipient) who will then arrange necessary process with the old provider (Donor). This is also known as 'Recipient-Led' porting. The UK is the only country to not implement a Recipient-Led system, where a customer wishing to port his/her number is required to contact the Donor to obtain a Porting Authorisation Code (PAC) which he/she then has to give to the Recipient. Once having received the PAC the Recipient continues the port process by contacting the Donor. This form of porting is also known as 'Donor-Led' and has been criticized by some industry analysts as being inefficient. It has also been observed that it may act as a customer deterrent as well as allowing the Donor an opportunity of 'winning-back' the customer. This might lead to distortion of competition, especially in the markets with new entrants that are yet to achieve scalability of operation.

India's already delayed launch of Mobile Number Portability (MNP) is likely to be pushed back by yet another three months. The launch which has been planned for April is now unlikely to be available before July, at the earliest. The decision to delay the launch was decided at an internal meeting of the Department of Telecom (DoT) today, highly placed sources told The Economic Times newspaper. The service was due to launch on Jan 1st for the main Metro markets, however, the Department of Telecom had agreed to delay the launch after the network operators said that they were not ready with their network, with a nationwide rollout at the end of March. The number of operators and as many as 12 billion calls per day, the system has to be in place and this may take some more time, they said. Asked whether by July the service will come into effect, sources said this will be the minimum period required for implementing the service. The DoT guidelines created geographical division of the country into two Number Portability Zones, each consisting of 11 licensed service areas. Subsequently, one operator in each zone was selected. Syniverse Technologies was granted license for operating in Northern and Western India and MNP Interconnection Telecom Solutions was granted license for Eastern and Southern India.

According to a Nielsen survey last year, it seems that close to one in five (18%) Indian mobile phone subscribers could change their mobile operator when Mobile Number Portability is introduced into the market.  The government had earlier given the deadline of March 31 for implementing MNP across the country. Minister of State for Communications and IT Gurudas Kamat had earlier informed the Rajya Sabha that the March 31 deadline for MNP would not be met.
"Since all networks are not likely to be completely ready by March 31, the deadline is not likely to be met," he had said.

Major Don-Chebe, Head of Corporate Communications from Vodafone Ghana said; every mature telecom market in the world is implementing MNP and he doesn't see the reason why Ghana, with as many as six GSM Operators and a penetration level of more than 55% [55 per cent] of its population shouldn't implement MNP. He also stressed that, when MNP is implemented, customers who are trapped on other networks would now be freed and can now enjoy quality of service from any of the GSM Networks of their choice in the country. This technology is not expensive as somebody would be thinking. The advantages outrun the disadvantages in many ways.

Mobile Number Portability, Mobile Number Portability in india, date Mobile Number Portability, mnp, mnp launch, mnp details, mnp delayed, switching mobile operators, switching mobile carriers, mnp in india, switching your mobile number, mobile networks