Egypt’s National Telecom Regulatory Authority (NTRA) has fined the country’s mobile operators a combined total of EGP25 million (USD1.6 million) after their services failed to meet minimum quality standards.
Daily News Egypt reports that the regulator confirmed the penalties in its quarterly update on service quality. In the same release, the NTRA stated that it had cleared the installation of 641 new mobile base stations during the third quarter, up 62% from Q2 2021. The regulator noted that the sharp increase was made possible by the introduction of a new system aimed at streamlining installations.
The NTRA stated that 500 villages are set to receive 4G coverage under the Decent Life project, a nationwide initiative aimed at developing rural regions. CommsUpdate reports that Egypt’s Universal Service Fund (USF) is providing EGP1.5 billion for the project, which is on track to be completed by mid-2022.
The regulator also noted that it had introduced a new metric for voice quality standards based on the time needed to begin a call. Although it has issued fines to the country’s operators over their service quality, the NTRA stated that in this regard, all four of the main mobile providers in Egypt had improved, with the average start time down by 27% in Q3 2021 to a peak of 8 seconds.
