Globe, Smart say there is no network congestion

In a last ditch effort to make the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) decide favorably on the status of their networks, rival firms Globe Telecom and Smart Communications Inc. have submitted additional evidence to prove that they are not suffering from congestion.

The NTC already completed the technical investigation last Sept. 25 but Smart and Globe are still trying to convince the regulatory body to again look into their respective networks.

Smart has informed the commission that it has failed to include 18 cell sites in the list of those which the NTC should have checked, and has, thus, requested for a reinspection.

Globe, on the otherhand, told the NTC that recent developments in its mobile expansion program should also be taken into consideration.

In its report to the NTC, Globe claimed that its network can already accommodate as much as 2.6 million subscribers as of Sept. 28.

At present, Globe’s subscriber traffic report showed that it has 1.8 million customers. "We believe that this briefing paper will be of great relevance in your continuing technical inspection and evaluation of our network and that the paper will enable you to input new factors in and bring up-to-date whatever inspection report and findings you may have already made given these new supervening facts and developments," Globe said.

According to Globe, the company is open to a physical inspection of the new facilities which were part of its expansion efforts last August and September.

Earlier, NTC Deputy Commissioner Nestor Dacanay expressed doubts over the accuracy of the report made by its common carriers authorization division in view of the time constraints and limited manpower.

The commission only has less than 20 engineers tasked to inspect the network switches and cellular sites of the two cellular firms numbering over 1,000 in Metro Manila alone.

As a result, he said that the NTC has decided to recompute the figures presented before they are submitted to President Estrada.