‘Begging’ Leads Uganda To Install Technology That Tracks Daily Revenues Of Telcos: Does Zimbabwe Need It Too?

Uganda’s tales are always gripping, from social media tax to now, tracking revenues of telecoms operators. The Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) said it now has new equipment to monitor the daily revenues of the telecom companies. The system dubbed as “intelligent network monitoring system”  (INMS) tracks telecoms’ revenues as they enter their coffers daily.

Whats the reason behind installing INMS?

The UCC suspects that the telecoms companies are robbing it. Therefore, INMS is being introduced to make sure that the UCC has a clear picture of how much the Telecoms are raking up, instead of having to beg to know how much they are earning.

The telecoms sector is dominated by companies such as MTN, Airtel, Africell etc. Before INMS, telecoms companies have been autonomously declaring their revenues to UCC.  Speaking about INMS, the UCC executive director, Mr. Godfrey Mutabazi, said;

We have a solution in place and it is functional and we know how much they are earning and we do not have to beg them to tell us and they know it,” he said…..We are using intelligent network monitoring system to track their revenues and government will collect the correct values based on what the system generates

According to the Daily Monitor, INMS will not only track voice and data revenues but will also monitor “transactions of the telecom operators, including mobile money and the newly introduced social media tax”. Let alone monitoring “the multi-vendor network data, network performance, customer experience records, service quality performance, signaling statistics, documented data selections, customized data filtering and user configurable access”.

I must confess, Uganda is the first country I have heard to implement this kind of technology. In fact, it’s the first time I have heard of a regulatory body suspecting its telecoms operators to defraud it by understating revenue. However, off the top of my head, if the UCC is truly suspicious I think its justified in installing INMS.

Does Zim need its own INMS?

No, I don’t think so. I wouldn’t expect POTRAZ or for that matter, the government to entertain such an idea because it has never suspected telecoms operators of defrauding it. It would be a good technology for POTRAZ to acquire if it wants to know the pattern of telcos revenue and perhaps make decisions based on identified trends (of revenue flow).