Impact of QoS Parameters on the Subscribers Volume of Cellular Operators across Indian States

Authors

  • Anshula Mohapatra, Shailesh Rastogi, Arpita Sharma

Abstract

 Over the past decade, the demand for wire-line and wireless services has increased multi-fold. As per India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF), India ranks second globally in having a vast telecommunication market, with the subscriber base increasing over 1.2 billion, enabling the rapid growth of commercial mobile service providers (CMSP). With the entry of multiple players in the CMSP space, the decision to choose amongst the cellular operators for customers narrows down to theserviceexperienceintermsofthenetwork-relatedparameters and customer service quality encountered by them, resulting in the change in subscriber volumes for each service provider. The paper aims at determining the impact of the Quality of Service (QoS) Parameters on the quantifiable subscriber volumes of the leading CMSPs across various Indian states. Secondary data was extracted and collated from the official website of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). The operator-wise subscriber volumes were collected from the COAI, DoT and TRAI. The QoS parameters are based on the quality of experience that the customer expects from the service provider. From secondary research of available literature, it was found that the various factors affecting customer satisfaction and churn rate are network performance, availability and reliability, thecall drop rate, network congestion, service quality. The significanceof various network related parameters such as the base transceiver downtime, call drop rate, call set-up success rate, accessibility to customer service was determined through a panel data regression on the cross-sectional data of operators across 12 states over a time period of 11 quarters. The findings for the model pertaining to subscribers across the states depicted that there are external factors that might be considered for explaining the variation in customer base. The results of operator-wise subscriber base panel regression model helped in understanding the significance of various network related parameters across operators. These findings will be instrumental in carving suggestions for the cellular operators related to the most critical factors that should be focused on to retain their subscribers and maximize their benefits.

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Published

2020-05-17

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Section

Articles