Professional Documents
Culture Documents
On
GrameenPhone
Report
On
Grameen Phone
Assistant Professor
Dear Sir:
I believe that you will be pleased to see my work. I also believe that this report
will be able to fulfill your expectation.
Sincerely yours,
………………….
MD: Feroz Alam
ID: 042-18-426
Ack nowledgement
As a market leader, GrameenPhone is continuously coming up with new ideas regarding its
products and services. Recently, the company is mainly focusing on the non-voice services.
Because, the company knows in near future, voice based services will reach to the maturity
stage which will make the business growth constant to some extents. Hence, the company is
trying to maintain the leading position in non-voices services as well like SMS, Push-Pull,
and Information related services at the early growing stage. These services are working as a
building block to increase GP’s service value.
Coming up with innovative service is easier than making subscribers aware of services.
Hence through this internship report I have tried to analyze the present situation of the
cellular phone industry in Bangladesh and GP’s position there in, find out the services that
Grameen phone is presently providing to its valued customers & their satisfaction level. 15
million people out of 140 million total citizen of Bangladesh are presently using cell phone; it
means that out of every 9 people one is using cell phone. In the third world country like
Bangladesh the amount of users is amazing. Grameenphone holds almost 61% market share
of telecom industry that is out of every 10 users 6 belongs to Grameenphone. So
GrameenPhone marketing strategy should be “Profitable growth & expanding market share
through satisfying existing customers”. I have also made a comparative service analysis of
various cellular phone companies in Bangladesh and drawn some valuable recommendation
to GrameenPhone to be the market leader in future in this competitive market.
A comprehensive survey was conducted to know about GP’s present position in the market
and its present service condition that is providing to its valued customers. The survey report
shows that Grameen phone is still a market leader in this industry but as it is becoming more
competitive day by day so Grameen phone should revise its service packages, quality with
more conveniently for the customers.
Among the other cellular phone companies GrameenPhone has some unique competitive
advantages in this industry in Bangladesh so if it is possible for GP to provide better services
with continuous innovative products it will add value to the company. Otherwise, in the long
run new innovation services will not give its ultimate success.
Table of Contents
Page
Topics
No.
Executive Summary
Chapter -1 1-5
Introduction
Chapter -2 6-11
Situation Analysis: An overview of the
Wireless Phone Industry
Chapter -3 12-29
Company Profile
Chapter -4 30-56
Customer Management Division
Chapter -5 57-66
A comparison of service among the wireless
phone operators
Chapter -6 67-78
Customer Satisfaction & survey findings
Chapter -7 79-84
Recommendation & Conclusion
Appendix-1 85-86
Appendix-2 87
Appendix-3 88-89
INTRODUCTION
GP, in its operation, has to address a large number of customers throughout the country. It is
therefore imperative to get to the customers to know their impression on the services of this
important communication medium. This encouraged the researcher to choose the topic of this
internship programme as “Customer satisfaction of GrameenPhone”.
Background of the Industry:
In a highly populated country like Bangladesh, telecommunication can play a vital role to
boost the economy and social level of people. The introduction of cellular phones has
dramatically changed the lives of businesses and individuals.
As there is a growing trend of workers turning from farming to other occupations, the need
for mobiles is increasing among the thousands of impoverished villages. The overall
efficiency of other business has increased as an aftermath of the government's decision of
deregulating the telecommunications sector, which until the late 1980s had been a state
monopoly.
Privatization of the telecommunications sector began in 1989, when Sheba and BRTA were
awarded 25-year licenses to install and operate fixed-wire lines and wireless services in rural
areas. The same year, Pacific Telecom Bangladesh got the government's permission to launch
the country's first cellular phone and paging service sold under brand name CityCell in
collaboration with a Hong Kong-based company. The company targeted only the higher class
of the society. During that time price of mobile was above Tk 50,000/=. Naturally, the growth
of the industry was too slow. CityCell had a virtual monopoly until 1996, when the
government gave licenses to three more companies to operate cell phones in Bangladesh. So,
the government decided to bring more companies in the market and break the monopoly.
After careful evaluation the government decided to provide three licenses to GrameenPhone,
TM International (AkTel), and Sheba Telecom (Banglalink). Only CityCell is using Code
Division Multiple Access (CDMA) technology, AkTel, GrameenPhone, Banglalink these
three companies are using GSM (Global System for Mobile) technology. GSM is the most
popular mobile telecommunication technology in the world. About 60% of the cell phone
users of the world use GSM technology.
These three new companies entered the market, not only helped trim down over-dependence
on BTTB's fixed-line system, but also made mobile phones cheaper and easier to get. The
price of a cell phone came down from $2,000 to as low as $100, depending on the features of
the handset and SIM price is only Tk.200-300.
A definite development has been observed in the Business Market with comparatively high
expectations. Customer maturity and anticipation regarding technology has increased over
time. Rumors regarding new entrants have groomed expectations in the market.
Consequently, people are expecting cheaper handsets with lowered airtime.
The existing Cellular phone companies in Bangladesh are CityCell (Pacific Bangladesh
Telecom Limited), GrameenPhone Ltd., AkTel Ltd. Banglalink and TeleTalk. Among these
company GrameenPhone, AkTel and Banglalink adopted GSM technology and Citycell the
market pioneer started with CDMA technology.
Objectives of the Study:
This Programme was designed to accomplish three objectives. The objectives were identified
through a closer interaction and exchange of views with the management of CMD. The
objectives are:
To find out the satisfaction level of GrameenPhone subscribers.
Based on the topic chosen, the researcher was assigned the task in the Customer Management
Division (CMD) in GP. This divisions consists of a big team of about 1500 employees. Its
functions relate with the customer service after the sales occur. Prime functions and activities
of the GP Customer Management Divisions cater to all after-sales services starting from
activation of subscriptions, all customer contacts (Centralized Call Center, Customer
Relations Centers, and centralized Customer Communications), billing, bank communication,
bill collection throughout the country, helpline services, GPSDs etc.
Limitations of the Study:
GrameenPhone basic strategy is widening its market through its emerging countrywide
network. As a result of this strategy, the subscribers are from different segments or from
different income levels. Moreover, the subscribers are scattered all over the country.
The time constraint confined the study mostly on the data collected in Dhaka zone. Moreover,
it was not possible to get all required internal information of the company as these are treated
as confidential to the company.
The outcome of the study can thus be regarded exploratory, and may not be treated as
absolute for the whole country. In latter case a more comprehensive study is required.
SITUATION ANALYSIS
An Overview of the Wireless Phone Industry
At the initial stage of the mobile telecom industry because of high startup cost and high tariff
there was only a few numbers of subscribers. In 1997 there were approximately 23,000
mobile subscribers around the country with a low market penetration rate (.02%). At present,
the number of mobile users in the country is approximately 5.87 million and among them
GP’s subscribers are over 3.5 million. Right now, in mobile industry, Bangladesh has four
private companies and newly TeleTalk a sister concern of BTTB has entered in the market
with a target to get 0.25 million subscribers by first 6 months of launch and 1 million by
2006. TeleTalk has offered lower rate with PSTN connection all over the country. The total
number of districts covered in mobile industry has been increased to 61 in 2004 from 1in
1997. The total telecom growth has increased to 55% in 2004 from 19% in 1998. Initially,
mobile growth rate was too high which was 178% in 1998 and now it is come into 67% in
2004. That means this industry is now going to its maturity stage. From the comparison of
different operators’ subscriber base, it can be concluded that GP is still leading the way with a
sharp distance. Though Citycell is the first mobile operator in Bangladesh, it is not doing its
business so good. It is increasing its subscriber from 2000 in 1997 to 6149111 in 2005. On
the other hand, AkTel is growing its subscribers faster than Citycell which is from 3000 in
1997 to 3000000 in 2005.
1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007
Market 0.02 0.05 0.10 0.53 3.61%
0.21% 0.87% 1.88% 3.13%
Penetration % % % %
Districts 61
1 2 26 36 40 49 59 61
Covered
Mobile Growth 1 120%
96% 121% 149% 65% 116% 67%
rate 78%
Telecom Growth 65%
19% 17% 34% 66% 42% 40% 55%
Rate
Subscribers base
Grameen 18,00 30,00 60,00 191,69 471,3 775,31 1878,0 2424,1 615911
Phone 0 0 0 0 71 0 00 77 1
Citycell 19,00 26,20 100,0 160,00 225000 370,00 35000
2,000 33,500
0 0 00 0 0 0 00
AkTel 12,00 28,50 96,00 150,00 300,00 1000,0 28000
3,000 34,200
0 0 0 0 0 00 00
BanglaLink 11,00 27,00 100,00 10000
- 3,000 19,000 60,000 70,000
0 0 0 00
TeleTalk - - - - - - - - 60000
Table : Development of the Telecom Market 1997-2005
The penetration rate of mobile phone industry in Bangladesh is increasing rapidly. The rate
was increasing slowly from 1997 to 1999. After that, the rate was increasing faster and now
till Nov” 05 the penetration rate is 3.61% and only GrameenPhone’s penetration rate is
2.12%. Fixed network penetration is .72%.
Market Share of Mobile Operators:
The mobile phone market consists of five operators. Out of which, 61% share of the market
belongs to GP, 3% to CityCell, 28% to AkTel, 7% to Banglalink and the rest of 1% to
TeleTalk as of Nov, 05. GP holding the major share maintains a ‘market leader’ strategy to
all other players in the market. The telecom market intends to grow at penetration rate of
more than 3.48%; where GP has already penetrated at 2.12%.
28%
7%
61% 3%
1%
TeleTalk
TeleTal
Competitive Position of the mobile operator:
• Dhaka • Sylhet
• Chittagong • Rajshahi
• Khulna • Barisal
District Covered
70
60
50
Districts
40
30 60 61 61
47
20 36 40
26
10
1 2
0
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 Mar' 05
Year
The zone in which a subscriber is registered with GrameenPhone is that subscriber's Home
Zone, and all other zones are Remote Zones.
CUSTOMER MANAGEMENT DIVISION
The Customer Management Division of GrameenPhone Ltd. provides a full range of after-
sales service customized to the needs of the valued customers. Efforts are made to offer
complete service through all the contact points dedicated for GP customers at every
opportunity through Call Center, Customer Management Centers and Customer
Communication.
The Slogan Of CMD is:
Customer Management
division
Human Communicati
GP-Regular, the oldest product of GrameenPhone retains its popularity through its full
connectivity to all networks including fixed line telephony services.
EASY Pre-Paid, because of Low flat tariff and nationwide mobility, it’s a Pre-paid
service, no monthly rent required and instant use due to pre-activation, no hassles of
bill payment.
Information Service through mobile because of easy access, interesting theme, and
reasonable rate and for being new and innovative.
Village phone because of use of Grameen Bank’s borrower network and for having
access to BTTB & ISD.
Subscription Unit
Customer Management Division (CMD) of GrameenPhone Limited is consists of 15 units;
Subscription Unit is one on them. This is the unit that remains very close to the customer and
always busy to meet the satisfaction of GPs’ valued customer.
Subscription Services
Subscription Unit is the unit that performs its job in touch with all other divisions. The
following figure [Fig-3.1] shows us the subscription services in a whole.
ii) Technical
Subscription unit also has some technical responsibilities. Among them quality
assurance of the SIM features, testing the SIM, SIM problem is important.
iii) Legal
Subscription service also deals with the legal issue and various legal procedures.
iv) IT
Subscription Unit also has IT services. This service mainly develop the customize
software for maintaining the customer database and other soft wares to maintain
efficient customer relation. All the Customer Relation Centers all over the country
are connected with central database. This network maintenance is also a
subscription unit’s service.
Technical
● Quality Assurance
● Test SIM
● Pre Paid Reconnection
● SIM Problem
Sales & Marketing
● Number allocation
● Activation Papers Legal
● International Roaming ● Procedure
● Subscription Paper Receiving
● Product and Planning
● Test SIM
SUBSCRIPTI
ON
IT
Finance ● Software Development
● International Roaming ● Networking between all CRC
Information Activation,
Center Fax or Instant Migration,
courier Services SIM Change, Sorting
Services International
Roaming,
WAP
Subscriber Dealers or
Agents Electronic
Filing
Corporate Check,
Care Provisioning,
Quality
Check
Sales
Center
Manual
filing
Sales and Number Hotline- 155
Marketing allocation
Fig: Subscription Services flow Chart
CUSTOMER SATISFACTION
The Customers are in the mainstream of sales oriented services. The success of such
companies largely depends on the satisfaction of the customers .The buyers are happy if the
product and/or the services meet their expectations. If their requirements do not meet the
expectations the buyers become discontented, they are delighted when the performance fulfils
their requirements.
Customers’ past buying experiences, the opinion of friends, associates, marketer, competitor
information and promises lead to the expectations. Marketer must be careful to set the right
level of expectations. If they set expectations too low, they may satisfy those who buy but fail
to attract enough buyers. In contrast, if they raise expectations too high, buyers are likely to
bedisappointed. Dissatisfaction can arise either from a decrease in product and service quality
or from an increase in customer expectations. In either case, it presents an opportunity for
companies that can deliver superior customer value and satisfaction.
To-day most successful companies have taken the strategy of are raising expectations and
delivering performance to match. Such companies track their customers’ expectations,
perceived company performance, and customer satisfaction. Highly satisfied customers
produce several benefits for the company. Satisfied customers are fewer prices sensitive
remain customers for a longer period and talk favorably to others about the company and its
products and services.
Although the customer centered firm seeks to deliver high customer satisfaction relative to its
competitors, it does not attempt to maximize customer satisfaction. A company can always
increase customer satisfaction by lowering its price and increasing its services, but it may
result in lower profits. Thus, the purpose of marketing is to generate customer value
profitably.
Now, we have a very good idea regarding the importance of customer satisfaction. So, it is
also important for the company to know about the satisfaction level of the customers. When
any problem is identified, it becomes easier to solve the problem.
The next part of this paper has focused on the “Customer Satisfaction Factors of
GrameenPhone”. It is done through a research survey to find out the customer satisfaction
level of GrameenPhone.
Customer Satisfaction Factors of GP:
Airtime:
Air time is the core offering of GrameenPhone, So, quality of communication network
availability, etc, are the most important customer satisfaction factors, quality of airtime
depends on the ratio of subscribers and transmission base station. It the numbers of
subscribers are increased without developing the network, quality of airtime goes down
After sales services is very important in the mobile telecommunication industry. GP has
extensive after sales customer care tools. Here foucus on these step by step.
1. Helpline:
GP is the first company that introduced 24hours helpline in Bangladesh. In this part of my
paper I tried to focus on the existing operations of the helpline service of GP.which will
enable us to understand the importance of the helpline service.
Customer need to pay TK. 4 per minute to take the service from helpline.
3. Information Centers:
Most of the problems of the subscribers are solved by the helpline service. But there are
some problems that can not be solved there. Subscriber need to come physically to deal with
that problems.Grameen Phone has seven customer relation centers and 380 GPSDs which
provide services all over the country.
These Customer Relation Centers are situated in the prime divisional head quarters like
Dhaka, Chittagone, Sylhet, Rajshahi and Khulna and GPSDs situated all most everywhere in
Bangladesh. In these information centers the subscribers can come directly with their
problems like billing, address change, SIM change, handset problems, etc.
These after sales services are very crucial to keep subscribers satisfied regarding
GrameenPhone.
Survey Findings:
In order to measure the satisfaction of the customers a series of questions were asked to the
customers with the help of a questionnaire, the data from these questions are tabulated below.
For clear understanding, the overall satisfaction has been divided into satisfaction with the
package and satisfaction with the after sales service. As already mentioned, the survey was
conducted among hundred GrameenPhone subscribers, it was conducted in the information
center as subscribers from different areas in Dhaka come to this center
Interpretation of Survey Data:
a. I use GrameenPhone because it is the best:
Strongly Agree
5%0%
15% 25%
Agree
Strongly Disagree
70% 63%
Strongly Agree
60%
50%
Percentage
Agree
40% 29%
30% Neither Agree nor Disagree
20%
8%
10% 0% 0% Disagree
0%
Disagree
Neither
Strongly Disagree
Strongly
Strongly
Agree
Agree
Farctors
Strongly Agree 4%
Agree 49%
Neither Agree nor Disagree 13%
Disagree 23%
Strongly Disagree 11%
60%
49%
50% Strongly Agree
Percentage
40%
Agree
30% 23%
Neither Agree nor Disagree
20% 13% 11%
10% 4% Disagree
0%
Disagree
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
Neither
Strongly
Agree
Strongly
Agree
Agree
Farctors
d. I am satisfied with the service (quality of airtime and network availability) of GP.
Strongly Agree 9%
Agree 26%
Neither Agree nor Disagree 24%
Disagree 30%
Strongly Disagree 11%
35%
30%
30% 26%
24% Strongly Agree
25%
5% Disagree
0% Strongly Disagree
Disagree
Neither
Strongly
Strongly
Agree
Agree
nor
Farctors
13%
23%
Strongly Agree
19%
Agree
40% 35%
35% Strongly Agree
30%
Percentage
Disagree
Neither
Strongly Disagree
Strongly
Strongly
Agree
Agree
Farctors
Strongly Agree 9%
Agree 40%
Neither Agree nor Disagree 20%
Disagree 15%
Strongly Disagree 10%
Strongly Agree
10% 9%
Agree
15%
Neither Agree nor
Disagree
40% Disagree
20%
Strongly Disagree
Strongly Agree 3%
Agree 18%
Neither Agree nor Disagree 14%
Disagree 37%
Strongly Disagree 28%
40%
35%
30%
Percentage
25%
20% 37%
15% 28%
10% 18%
14%
5%
3%
0%
Strongly Agree Neither Agree Disagree Strongly
Agree nor Disagree Disagree
Factors
68 Network
70
Coverage
60
50 International
40 37 Roaming
30 Value added
20 16 Services
10 1112
After Sales
0 service
No. of
subscribers Easy Bill Payment
System.
As we can see from the above table and the chart, maximum number of subscribers would
purchase a cellular service which has a good network coverage, apart from that the other
criteria which is they consider after network coverage is easy bill payment system.
70 68 Network Coverage
60
50 International
40 37 Roaming
30 Value added
20 16 Services
1112 After Sales
10
0 service
No. of Easy Bill Payment
subscribers System.
From the chart and the table above it can be seen that most of the subscribers purchased
GrameenPhone due its network coverage. Also by looking at the figures the bill payment
system and the 24 hrs customer service were the other common attributes which attracted the
subscribers to purchase GrameenPhone
From the above table it can be seen that most of the subscribers either call up the GP hotline
or they go to the information center.
l. Are the GP employees able to solve your problem regarding the following criteria’s?
From the table above it can be seen that regarding almost every criteria, the Grameen Phone
employees are able to solve the problem most of the time.
But at the same time there is quite a large number who always do not get a solution to their
problem this occur because for certain queries a subscriber has to go to the information
center and GrameenPhone has only one information center, due to this shortage a customer is
made to wait long hours in a queue. Also many times when the line takes more than a day to
be reconnected.
m. Subscribers’ perception of the different Grameen Phone package
It can be seen from the above table that most of the subscribers from every package perceive
their respective packages as good packages but they feel that the services can be improved.
According to the four faces of customer loyalty by Smart Loyalty, we could consider the 10%
to fall under truly loyal customers as highly satisfied, 69% of the subscribers could be
considered as accessible because they feel that the services can be improved, these
subscribers want to give a chance to GP to earn their loyalty. 18% could be considered as
trapped because they use GrameenPhone as no other company offers them the services and
only 3% fall under High-risk as these subscribers do not like the GrameenPhone services and
are looking for alternatives.
n. Opinion whether GrameenPhone subscribers would remain loyal if another
company came up with packages of similar features.
Finding on Analysis
Several frequency distribution have been constructed to find the answers
regarding the customers perspective of grameen phone line users. By the
analysis. Some limitation of grameen providers have been identified. The most
important finding of the analysis is customers have claimed some problem on
their network system. It is found that some of the customer of grameen hardly
got connected after calling more then 4 or 5 times. This problem happens
especially in case of connecting outside Dhaka . it is found from the analysis on
customers occupation that the grameen is being more used by the students. Also
the have been frequently changing their choices regarding mobile service
providers. By proper customer care, once they catch this group for long
time,they can better perform in the market. Analysis shows that80% of the
customers use prepaid lines. One of the significant finding from the analysis is
that customer who use grameen , use the line because of minimum call charge
compared to other. So further study is needed to understand the related
problems and the company should offer more facilities to the competitors to
increase their customer and present users satisfaction.
RECOMMENDATION & CONCLUSION
The means to overcome the needs of the customers have been discussed in this chapter. These
lead to the various recommendations given in chapter 7. Hopefully these recommendations
will create awareness to GrameenPhone authority to resolve the problems of the customers.
However, there is dissatisfaction among the GP users with the service of the company. Many
important factors are acting as reasons behind this overall dissatisfaction. Quality of airtime
and network availability is not satisfactory.Grameen Phone connections are difficult to reach
sometimes. It so happens that the subscribers used to pay extra money to get the access. This
is especially true for prepaid service. It is encouraging that very recently situation has
improved to a certain extent bases on the findings in this report.
The “Info Centers” of GP are very important for some after sales services. But, there is
shortage of capacity of this service, In Dhaka “Info Centers” are located at Gulshan,
Dhanmondhi, Mothijheel, Uttara, these four centers cannot cope with the demand of vastly
populated Dhaka city. The GP helpline is also an important customer care tool. But it is also
in shortage of capacity. Subscribers need to spend significant amount of time to reach the
helpline. Behavior of the helpline CM is also sometimes unmanageable. They are to handle
continuous queries. So it may so happen at times the CMs cannot keep up smiling voice and
amenable behavior.
Most of the subscribers are not happy with the billing rate of GP.They think it is too high in
the context of Bangladesh, But they are still using the service as GP is still more easily
accessible. Many newer companies are coming up with the lower price; it is thus a great
challenge to GP to face,
Another significant dissatisfaction of the GP users is that most of the GP connections are
mobile to mobile. Access to BTTB is rare. Wider access with BTTB will boast the
subscribers. Most alarming thing is that most of the GrameenPhone users are not loyal
towards the company. If BTTB or any other company comes up with same sort of services,
the GP subscribers might switch to that company
References
Annual Report
Sample Questioner
1. User’s Name:……………………………………………………
2. Age:………………………………………………………………
3. Occupation:…………………………………………………………