Telecommunications provider CCT Global Communications experienced a “critical failure” in its mobile phone network on Dec. 29, causing all of its phone customers to lose service for nearly three days.
As of the Beacon’s print deadline yesterday, the company’s network was still down, though CCT General Manager Jose Luis Fernandez said the company had used other providers’ networks to restore service to its customers by Dec. 31.
Mr. Fernandez said the company was able to quickly develop a “domestic roaming agreement” with competitors LIME and Digicel, and it hopes to restart its own network by the end of the week.
“The important thing is that we have been able to put in an alternative operational arrangement to make sure that our customers continue to have access to their service,” Mr. Fernandez said, adding that CCT customers will be charged their regular rates for service.
The outage only affected mobile phones and not the company’s wireless services, he said.
The roaming agreement covers all of CCT’s phone services, including domestic and international calls, text messages, and voicemail access, according to Mr. Fernandez.
Cause of the outage
Mobile phone networks typically consist of a series of towers to send and receive calls and a “switch” that routes the calls where they need to go, the general manager said. The CCT network went down after the failure of a device known as a “base station controller,” which communicates between the towers and the switch.
Redundancies are built in to the base station controller, but two elements failed at the same time, causing the outage, Mr. Fernandez explained.
“A critical failure could happen to anybody,” he said. “This time it happened to CCT. This doesn’t mean that we didn’t have the right procedure in place. It just happened.”
He added, though, that the company plans to revisit its maintenance procedures and study the lessons of the failure to prevent it from recurring.
CCT customers commenting on social media websites such as Facebook were dismayed at the news of the outage.
“A day and a half with out a phone at this time of year is a bit unacceptable. come on CCT .. please get this fixed so we can wish our loved ones a Happy New Year [sic],” wrote a woman who identified herself as Elaine Couper, commenting on the Facebook page “BVI Community Board.”
Commenting on the same page, a user identified as Riiva “StoneAngel” Williams called the outage the “height of nonsense.”
“I got business to do, call to make et cetera [sic],” she wrote.
Government offices, many of which rely on CCT phones to conduct official business, were also affected.
Police Information Officer Diane Drayton said Monday that because the force’s radio system is currently limited, officers with government-issued CCT phones had to use their own phones or otherwise “make do.”
Gov’t oversight
Contacted Tuesday, Guy Malone, the CEO of the Telecommunications Regulatory Commission, said CCT has kept in contact with the agency and the public about the situation and is currently compliant with its duties under the Telecommunications Act, 2006.
“Under the conditions of their licence, they are doing what they are required to do,” Mr. Malone said.
Mr. Fernandez expressed his gratitude for his competitors’ assistance, adding that CCT has helped both companies through similar difficulties in the past.
“When you have an emergency or extraordinary situation, it’s customary that one company help the other company that is in need,” he said.
He added that CCT’s postpaid customers will receive credit on their next bill for the two days during which they had no service. The company plans to do something similar for its prepaid subscribers, he said.
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