Thank me for fixing the Top 3 issues faced in your Wireless Broadband Connection!

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People often start to fancy the luxury wireless connection brings with it, only to be caught up with some minor issues which mar the experience. Here’s a rundown on some of the problems.

1) Infected domains: Often we don’t give a second thought while automatically getting the DNS settings from the cable company or the operators. But if you are a small scale user, try finding an alternate DNS from providers like GooglePublicDNS to get hold of secure domains. And yes, less congested the line, better is the performance.

2) Going beyond the encryptions: So what does one do when a neighbour or visitor wants to have access to the wireless network?  However smart the encryption key is, once shared, it won’t stop the neighbour’s teenager from visiting risky domains. In such cases grant them a temporary guest access only to the network and safeguard your data on hard drives. Check with your vendor for this option.

3) Finding out who’s consuming your bandwidth: Ever wondered why the speeds suddenly drop in middle of browsing sessions. Maybe your system has been compromised and somebody else is using it too. Track them down under the “Client list” or “DHCP users list”. Or get a monitoring tool to ensure router notifies you in case of foreign access.

Stay updated and get the best out of your wireless broadband.


3G in India Tier 2-3 towns – Myth or reality?

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With rural India steadily catching up with its urban counterpart’s insatiable hunger for bandwidth, it’s time to introspect whether Indian telecom industry has delivered on its 3G promises. The scope for market, whether in educational or professional domain, is huge and will only increase further as tablets get cheaper. But the lack of infrastructural investment and development does seem to be pulling the providers back to the old era. So here’s a quick thought on what’s gone right and what needs to be worked on.

It’s imperative that the coverage logistics need to be top notch. Tier 2 and 3 can boast of at least basic infrastructure but in such cases, pricing seems to be on a higher side. High prices for video or data transmission at mediocre speeds are lending a bad name to services which are already facing a disinterested audience.

Dishing out some smartly wrapped contract plans is an option to further penetrate in market where 3G handsets are not so common.  Mobile news and episodes are something which will be in demand in near future, and a stable subscriber base will help providers push this rich content smoothly. But if they are unable to push out the wired connections solely on merit, times ahead seem bleak for 3G in smaller towns.


4 Ways to Save Immediate Money on Your Mobile Bills

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Easiest route to transforming oneself from a harried cell user to a smart one who smiles all the way to the bank is in these five little not-so-secret DO’s.

1) Ask the right questions: Go to the customer care centre and ask the guys to show you non-contract, minimalist plans. No frills attached. Yes such plans do exist, but are never marketed. It’s akin to choosing a pure iPod over a 5-in-1 player.

2) Get rid of the Flab: Flab is that approximately 30-40 % part of your plan that you never avail of. It comes sweetly bundled with your mobile plan and you keep paying for it every month. Think of all those 20 buttons on your remote which you don’t use regularly. THAT is FLAB.

3) United we stand: Coax your colleagues at workplace to form a group. IT sector has often seen generous offers from these companies, offering Group discounts which seem insanely high.

4) Keep a tab: A simple math of your incoming, outgoing calls and texts will reveal the usage pattern per month. Downgrade your plan if you aren’t consuming the tariff at its optimum.

When implemented, these small tips will help bring down your mobile expenses considerably, and don’t forget to look into your bill carefully before making the final payment. It doesn’t hurt to be a little careful!


The hidden Costs of a Post-Paid Mobile Bill

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A majority of people opt for a post-paid mobile connection as opposed to a pre-paid one, believing it would be less cumbersome. More often than not, this assumption falls flat on its face; the sole reason being hidden costs that customers had absolutely no clue about.

1) Contracts: Although this is a fairly new practice, post-paid mobile plans may involve yearly or half-yearly contracts. This, at the very onset, is binding, and even if you are not satisfied with the service provider and want to discontinue their services, you have no choice but to continue paying bills nevertheless.

2) Surprise bills: This is something every post-paid customer has to go through atleast once. It’s a rite of passage. Telecom companies may charge you for calls you never made, and since you don’t have any efficient way of keeping tracks of all your calls, you ultimately end up paying more.

3) Hidden costs: This is a sure-shot way of companies over-charging you, and more often than not, one has to be very careful to avoid these costs. This may include charges for a caller tune, special ringtones, astrology services, SMS alerts or MMS services you never activated.

4) Monthly Rent: If your post-paid connection does not have a contract and surprise bills and hidden costs have not bothered you yet, no need to celebrate. Your monthly rent is still making sure you end up paying more even when you use the same talk-time as a prepaid customer. The call rates for prepaid and postpaid services are more or less same, and while pre-paid services offer full talk-time, the monthly rent and taxes in a post-paid plan is money that may not be spent well. However, thanks to the mobile number portability service, you can now wisely select the best postpaid plan to suit your needs and your pocket.


The Winds of Change are Here Again – Mobile Bills May Bloat by 30% this Year

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Our mobile sector is facing one of its worst patches, thanks to the ever increasing inflation and over-enthusiastic 3G jumps by most of the big players in market in the recent past. After the relatively mild response received by 3G services despite their advertising blitzkrieg, some known names in the telecom industry are taking the easy way out to cut their losses – that is, by shifting the losses on us. In case some of you haven’t noted as yet, Vodafone mobile plan in postpaid domain has already taken a jump and that too without much ruckus.

While we act finicky, ensuring that we choose the best mobile plan, our operators are keeping us oblivious to the pending rate hikes by 20-30%, which would come in effect from the month of March. Bharti Airtel has also accepted that similar changes could be seen in Airtel mobile plan and other Airtel deals to ensure that the company continues to notch up good figures.

It is a Catch 22 situation for all of us with almost all the larger operators jumping the gun, including state owned BSNL. While you and I are busy taking immense care to save mobile bill, it will hardly bear any fruit thanks to the industry that seems oblivious to their customer’s plight.


Mobile Number Portability Likely to take the High Road

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It’s no surprise that the Mobile Number Portability services in India will now be in demand like never before, thanks to Supreme Court of India dealing a major blow to the dubious transactions in 2G spectrum allocation. Both small and big names have come under scanner and Idea, biggest MNP gainer till date, is set to loose its advantage due to this move by supreme Court. So what does that mean to you and me?

With many people across the country, especially in buisness and profesional circles, choosing to continue with the same number, MNP will be easily the preferred option. Since many of the major Indian telecom players are not affected by this ruling, those amongst us who are affected will be eyeing the known names for their MNP switch. Keeping this in mind, the bigger operators have started  churning out best mobile plans as well as floating attractive deals to the allure new customers. State-owned telecom companies have also joined the race and sudden splurge in telecom advertising can be seen all over.

It is indeed a case of somebody’s loss resulting  in another’s gain. While TRAI chairman assures that there wont be a larger impact of this ruling, mainly due to restricted reach of new operators, it’s time for us to reap in the harvest with some real economical deals.


India’s 2G Spectrum Up for Sale – Takers Anyone?

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The Supreme Court of India delivered a strong verdict recently, cancelling all of the 122 licenses which were allotted during the shady 2G spectrum auction, and creating ripples amongst the industrial and political circles. TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India) has been instructed to come up with new framework for the fresh allocation of licenses and it would mostly be modeled upon the recent 3G auction which fetched rich gains for the government.

However, the dust hasn’t settled yet and neither does it show any signs of settling down soon with hurt investors promising to take the battle back to the court. Several mobile operators have openly declared their intentions to challenge the ruling and the protests might also hurt further telecom investments in the country. While most operators are busy promoting their 3G plan powered services, many are yet to come to terms with the revenue loss due to 2G cancellations.

Mid-February has been set as deadline for a 360 degree industry feedback. Though the signs of a renewed interest are slowly on rise, a muted response on this verdict by Indian majors is a chief cause of concern for smaller operators. It’s probably the common man who will have to bear the brunt in his monthly mobile bills.


Now Airtel to charge less for additional broadband services – Bringing Down the Cost on Pockets

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Bharati Airtel, one of the most visible private sector telecom operators in India as of today, has come out with yet another scheme to benefit its broadband customers. As of now, Airtel broadband customers, like customers of other service providers, have been accustomed to bills much more than their expectations in case of excessive usage and, in extreme cases, having their internet services put out of order. Now, with Airtel internet’s Smartbyte package, that is patently a thing of the past.

Indeed, for what Airtel Smartbyte offers is an additional quota of usage per month in lieu of a monthly addition of rupees ninety-nine to your bill. With this quota, even if you exceed usage, you can be sure to not entail payments at those high costs which you would otherwise be obliged to when you normally exceed your usage limit. That is because you are then charged at rates higher than those you are when you are within your usage limit. With the Smartbyte package, even though you don’t get unlimited internet, you do get some security of cheap internet and a leeway in usage.


BSNL suffers loss – Is Redundant Technology still Useful today?

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In a global scenario wherein technologies get updated on a daily basis and the new becomes old in a matter of weeks, to rely on fixed technological structures and not have reliable, timely updates and still expect to be pertinent is sheer folly. In the telecom sector in India, this point is amply illustrated by BSNL’s surrendering broadband services in as many as 17 circles throughout the country in order to seek a refund from the government in face of continuing losses.

This shocking revelation was made in October last year. BSNL broadband, by far one of the oldest internet providers in the country, has apparently not been able to keep up with rapid changes in technology and has, as an obvious enough result, suffered huge losses. Many commentators blame this on BSNL internet still being based on Wimax technology and on the losses incurred by the PSU as part of its acquiring 3G and BWA spectrum.

Be that as it may, one thing is as certain as BSNL’s continuing losses: BSNL broadband services are sure to suffer. In an overall public mood in which all things official and government are tainted with tags of inefficiency and incompetence, it is imperative that PSU’s try their level best to at least not lose their share of the market.


Making Mobile Banking Simpler – Airtel Launches Money Services

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Going to the bank is increasingly becoming redundant today. Instead, as an excellent alternative, we have a fitting range of convenient, easy to access banking services which enable us to handle almost all bank related work away from the bank. With these recent developments, going to the bank has lost its charm as well as utility for more regular activities. ATMs, internet banking and mobile banking have all changed the way we interact with our banks. Now money is transferred over phone calls, via messages and through the internet.

Airtel has contributed to this process by creating Airtel Mobile Banking services. These are part of Airtel’s larger Airtel Mobile Internet services which allow customers to access Airtel internet from their mobile phones. With Airtel’s Mobile Banking services, customers can shop, pay bills and get recharge done from their mobile phones: all this at reasonable rates with special Airtel mobile plans. Further, mobile banking allows customers to access their bank accounts and handle bank related work – make and review transactions, amongst others – just as they would on their computers as part of internet banking. You can use this service if you are an Airtel customer and if your bank has a tie up with Airtel and allows mobile banking.