Sabah broadband customers cry foul

Luke Rintod of FMT

Broadband providers have removed a popular
service which use to give 5-day access for
RM10. It's now 2-day access for the same price.

KOTA KINABALU: Telecommunication companies offering mobile or wireless broadband services here are again being accused of stunting broadband penetration by increasing charges but not the quality of service.

Rumbles of unhappiness are coming from customers in Sabah who are up in arms with the shortened access to the service from five days to two now for RM10.

Popular wireless broadband providers like Celcom, Maxis and DiGi which used to provide five days access for a RM10 reload, have replaced it with the two-day access forcing customers to cough-up more than double the amount for a week’s access to the internet.

They claim the move rubbishes the government’s effort to increase broadband penetration especially in areas like Sabah where broadband penetration still lags far behind Peninsular.

Sabah Minister of IT and Resource, Dr Yee Moh Chai, had said last year that by end of 2009 penetration was only 17% but  had targeted 30% penetration by end of last year but it was not known if this had been achieved.

The national broadband household penetration as announced last year by Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin was already 54% as of October.

A broadband user here, Jurli Dongkok, 21, said he had been using the flexible five-day access for RM10 package as it suits his budget as an unemployed person.

“I only reload my broadband when I am in need of internet and have a five-day access, but now with the same amount, I can only have internet access for two days. They should retain the old package, for the sake of consumers like me,” he told FMT.

Another user, Don Ferrer, 24, said it would definitely be more expensive now to subscribe for this package.

“I don’t understand why they promoted to sell us the broadband modem for RM165 promising a flexible five-day access for  RM10 but now suddenly it is only good for two-day access…it is misleading the consumer,” he said.

Cheaper and better in neighbouring countries

The RM10 for 5-day package by DiGi, Maxis and Celcom was considered to be the most conveniently flexible and cheapest for on-and-off internet users. Celcom has introduced a RM100 for 100 days package.

The federal government last year pledged during the Sixth Ministerial Forum on Information, Communication and Technology, to look into reducing broadband access fees nationwide to ensure that more people, especially those in the rural areas, could afford to use the service.

Minister of Information, Communication and Culture, Rais Yatim, said at the time that internet services in Malaysia could be cheaper and compared local broadband prices with Singapore where providers offer speeds of 2Mbps for the equivalent of RM20 whereas the same speed is offered at a hefty RM130 – RM199 in Malaysia.

The minister in-charge of IT also said then that local operators should look at how other countries within the region, like Korea, Taiwan, China, Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand set broadband prices.

Access to the broadband services is through fibre optic, copper line, third generation (3G), High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) and Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX).

As of last year, in Malaysia there were 52 license holders offering broadband services via various technologies, and of these, only 14 companies were offering the services and had clients. The rest were offering the services but still had no clients.

Among the companies offering broadband services here are Telekom Malaysia Bhd which offers the service via wired technologies, while those offering wireless services are Celcom, Maxis, DiGi, U-Mobile, Redtone-CNX, Y-Max, Packet One and Asiapace.