| VimpelCom explained what prepaid is The VimpelCom company, operating in the market of prepaid cellular services under the Bi+ brand since 1998, decided to explain to the uninitiated user the features of this product. Considering itself the undisputed legislator of prepaid in Russia, the operator could not resist attacking its respected competitor - the Mobile Telesystems (MTS) company, which launched a similar product (Jeans) in mid-November.
In a statement issued yesterday, VimpelCom emphasizes that the Bee Line GSM network currently serves about 3 million Bee+ users and connects several hundred such subscribers every day. This is the operator’s main argument in the dispute about the quality of “Bi +” and “Jeans” from MTS. It is noteworthy that the statement about the high quality of the product appeared after a failure in the Bee Line network on Monday. In the first half of the day, Bee Line subscribers were unable to access their accounts and service on-net three-digit numbers. Some subscribers noted communication failures, having encountered problems dialing and receiving incoming calls. Normal network operation was restored by noon. Representatives of VimpelCom explained this circumstance by the preventative work on the billing system that had lasted overnight.
But VimpelCom preferred to consider this event a local one and talk about the advantages of the Bi+ product. The company emphasizes the perfection of its billing, which allows for instant tariffing of services, unlike MTS, which does not have a special prepaid platform, and in the Jeans service package, the account is updated only some time after the last call. VimpelCom believes that depending on the network load, the delay in writing off an account at Jeans can reach an hour or more.
MTS company spokeswoman Eva Prokofieva is perplexed about the criteria for assessing the quality of the new MTS product. She recalled that repeated marketing research has confirmed that the consumer quality of services provided by the MTS network is 15-20% higher than that of Bee Line. The criteria for assessing delays in the tariffing of Jeans services are also not clear. The maximum time for debiting funds from the account of such a subscriber actually takes no more than 15 minutes, Ms. Prokofieva noted.
She also said that the company is quite pleased with the launch of the new service, which is already in good demand. Despite the fact that this is a new package of services and is not yet sold at all points of sale of MTS services, the company connects several thousand such subscribers every day, Ms. Prokofieva emphasized. Nadezhda KOSTYUK |
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