Living Wirefree - GPRS. Review on Loop Mobile Operator

I have been using BPL Mobile for the last three years and the experiance so far have been mixed.

In terms of Network Quality, I think all Operators are at the same level - Poor. Till the time TRAI does not introduce Number Portability(carrying the number even if one changes the operator), we will have to live with inferior coverage.

I have never faced any problems with billing !!! Actually that is because I have never bothered to check the details as my company pays the bills. ;)

A major disappointment is the Service and support. Minimum hold time is 10 minutes. And the hold time is made more irritating by the standard '' Our new value tarif plans have generated a tremendous response and all our ..............please stay on the line, you will be attended to shortly''. A sincere request to BPL, please change this Ghisa Pita message.

But the purpose of writing this review is something which I found good - GPRS.

I was on the loook out for option of connecting to Internet using phone(dial up). Although, I have Leased line connectivity in office, I need to use dial up ocassionaly due to some applications which I use, which are blocked by the Firewall. I had almost freezed on Reliance/Tata, when I Decided to check out the GPRS facility offered by BPL.

After the usual hiccups with the Call center, finally the executive arrived to give me a demo for GPRS. Setting up the connection and demo took no longer than 10 minutes and I immediately decided to take the service for two reasons. Speed : Better than a MTNL dial up, but more importantly Cost !!!! Unlimited surfing at just Rs. 500/- per month.

Although these days internet thru cable is also coming at affordable rates,I found this to be usefull as with my Laptop and Mobile(Infrared) I can connect to internet anytime, anywhere. ( This was actually useful just yesterday when I had to send out a urgent mail, I just sat in the cab, coonected to the internet using GPRS and done -mail sent !!!!).

However, everything is not honky-dory. On some days, the GPRS network just goes down( today it is down, although only for the second time in 2 months). Also,sometimes connections breaks and then you have to ''reboot'' the phone. Apart from these it is pretty much decent.

Now one can really say that we belong to the ''Wirefree Generation''