[kictanet] Safaricom changes to home fibre ToS

Thu Feb 18 10:01:12 EAT 2021

Listers,

Interesting discussion going on while I agree with Andrew who is on the
other side of the fence as a service provider. I will adopt a balanced view
to the matter at hand. Before COVID Service Providers had to really market
Fibre to the Home. At that particular time I believe the focus was on
wooing. I recall Customers would pay a monthly fee and get one months free
service. As an early adopter i must admit i never bothered about the terms
and conditions, i was dealing with Installers whose primary goal was to
close the deal. I can't recall ever discussing my account with my service
provider. COVID 19 actualised the Small Office Home Office concept, all of
a sudden the same link was being used for entertainment and business and
for our ever enterprising youth Sambaza Internet to the neighbourhoods. The
government also made sure it capitalized on excise duty and Value added Tax
to cash in on the demand for connectivity. This was all happening in a
period in which spending power was diminishing due to loss of jobs
occasioned by the pandemic. I think Service Providers were left with few
options to stay afloat 'offer the service at pocket friendly prices'' while
protecting the networks to guarantee quality of service hence the need for
the Fair usage policies. As a practitioner I have observed that most end
users want to pay the least and maximize on the bandwidth. Service
providers have to do a lot of end user education ''Digital Literacy'' that
includes legal issues which is not necessarily their core business. While i
am not absolving Safaricom i am empathizing with them and many other
Internet Service Providers that are struggling to Stay afloat as they power
the Digital Economy. In conclusion i would like to submit the following

1. That the Government through the Universal Service Fund capacitates
Internet Service Providers and other relevant Stakeholders such as KICTANet
to conduct literacy programs with respect to the role and obligations of
end users in so far as Fair Usage Policies are concerned.
2. That the Government reconsiders the Excise Duty and Value added Tax
imposed on Bandwidth until the country is sufficiently connected.

Thank you

On Thu, Feb 18, 2021 at 9:30 AM Grace Githaiga via kictanet <
kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke> wrote:

> 🙂
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Grace Githaiga*
>
> Twitter: @ggithaiga
>
> Skype: gracegithaiga
>
> Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gracegithaiga
>
>
> .*..**the most important office in a democracy is the citizen. So, you
> see, that’s what our democracy demands. It needs you!----Barrack Obama.*
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Andrew Alston <Andrew.Alston at liquidtelecom.com>
> *Sent:* 18 February 2021 9:01 AM
> *To:* Grace Githaiga <ggithaiga at hotmail.com>; KICTAnet ICT Policy
> Discussions <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
> *Subject:* Re: [kictanet] Safaricom changes to home fibre ToS
>
>
> Grace – as a further note.
>
>
>
> Under the FUP – you are NOT cut off – you still have “unlimited” internet
> – albeit more slowly – so the unlimited term still applies.
>
>
>
> To equate it to my previous email – you still have your freedom of speech
> – you just get to speak more slowly 😊
>
>
>
> Andrew
>
>
>
>
>
> *From: *Grace Githaiga <ggithaiga at hotmail.com>
> *Date: *Thursday, 18 February 2021 at 08:33
> *To: *KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
> *Cc: *Andrew Alston <Andrew.Alston at liquidtelecom.com>
> *Subject: *Re: [kictanet] Safaricom changes to home fibre ToS
>
> Andrew
>
> Thanks for breaking it down and being honest in letting us know that FUP
> is applied by practically all service providers. The question then remains,
> should Safcom have been have marketed the home fibre as 'unlimited?' And
> yes, I have read what you said about the FUP being tacked in T&Cs but
> should this not have been explicitly spelt out?
>
>
>
> Rgds
>
> GG
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Grace Githaiga*
>
> Twitter: @ggithaiga
>
> Skype: gracegithaiga
>
> Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gracegithaiga
>
>
>
> .*.**.the most important office in a democracy is the citizen. So, you
> see, that’s what our democracy demands. It needs you!----Barrack Obama.*
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> *From:* kictanet <kictanet-bounces+ggithaiga=
> hotmail.com at lists.kictanet.or.ke> on behalf of Andrew Alston via kictanet
> <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
> *Sent:* 18 February 2021 8:12 AM
> *To:* ggithaiga at hotmail.com <ggithaiga at hotmail.com>
> *Cc:* Andrew Alston <Andrew.Alston at liquidtelecom.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [kictanet] Safaricom changes to home fibre ToS
>
>
>
> I’ve hesitated to climb into this but – here goes anyway (everything
> written in personal capacity)
>
>
>
> Firstly – almost ALL ISP’s have FUP’s in some form or another – generally
> buried deep in the T&C’s – as someone stated to me – in the UK with certain
> ISP’s suddenly your line just gets slow and then when you call support you
> find yourself quietly diverted to the abuse department.
>
>
>
> The fact is that FUP’s are a necessary evil.
>
>
>
>    1. They prevent customers from reselling one account to multiple other
>    parties while sharing it using NAT – which impacts the financial viability
>    of the service and make its more expensive for everyone else in the end
>    2. ISP’s operate on contention ratios – if you do not impose some form
>    of FUP – you either have to put up the price or the contention ratios are
>    going to get out of whack – and everyone else is going to suffer.
>    3. Globally most home accounts use well shy of half a terabyte a month
>    – a terabyte of data is a LOT of data for a single home
>
>
>
> So let’s just put some context in what a  terabyte of data actually means
> – and I always use video as the prime gauge of this because it’s the
> easiest example.
>
>
>
> Your average Netflix 4k film runs at ~25mbit at absolute maximum if you
> are watching 4K on an HDR enabled TV.  That’s 22.5 Gigabytes of data every
> 2 hours – if you watch one 4K 2 hour movie every single day for a month you
> will eat 675gigs of data.  If we drop this to 1080p – which is far more
> common – you are using ~7 megabit of bandwidth – or 6.3gigs every 2 hours –
> if you watch 300 hours of 1080p content in a month – or 10 hours a day –
> you still haven’t hit that cap.
>
>
>
> Effectively – you could watch one 4K movie every day for a month – and
> still watch 150 40minute tv episodes in 1080p in a month – and have room to
> move.
>
>
>
> To look at it from another perspective – installation of something like
> Ubuntu Linux over the net – you could still over 400 machines on that kinda
> data load in a month.
>
>
>
> With regards to gaming – you may burn 100gig pulling down a game and game
> updates – but after that in game play you are using tiny amounts of
> bandwidth and could keep yourself playing easily for a month with space to
> spare.
>
>
>
> On Zoom calls – if you ran zoom 24 hours a day – for a month – you’d use
> less than 70% of that cap.
>
>
>
> Also – I might point out that the FUP’s slow your link down once you hit
> that cap – to a rate that is still useable if a little sluggish.
>
>
>
> Basically what I’m saying in all of this – Safaricom’s FUP and T&C’s to me
> seem perfectly reasonable and designed to protect the network – with the
> alternative being – the price goes up for everyone or everyone suffers
> because of the few when the network congests.  Bandwidth aint free – and
> you can’t have it both ways – the product still has to make financial sense
> to both the consumer and the provider
>
>
>
> Andrew
>
>
>
>
>
> *From: *kictanet <kictanet-bounces+andrew.alston=
> liquidtelecom.com at lists.kictanet.or.ke> on behalf of Adam Lane via
> kictanet <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
> *Date: *Thursday, 18 February 2021 at 07:36
> *To: *Andrew Alston <Andrew.Alston at liquidtelecom.com>
> *Cc: *Adam Lane <adam.lane at huawei.com>
> *Subject: *Re: [kictanet] Safaricom changes to home fibre ToS
>
> There's a webinar on this topic today for those interested
>
> A Public Policy Discussion on #HomeFibre and #FairUsage Policies in Kenya.
>
> 🗓️ Thursday, 18th February 2021
>
> 🕜 12:00PM - 1:30PM
>
> Sign up here:
>
> 🔗 https://t.co/LdD11UVy8q
>
> #LawyersHub #AfricaLawTech #ISP https://t.co/a5w9SUiAl6
>
>
> Speakers from CA, Safaricom, Liquid, KICTAnet,
>
>
>
> *From:*Beryl Aidi via kictanet <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
>
> *To:*Adam Lane <adam.lane at huawei.com>
>
> *Cc:*Beryl Aidi <bee.aidi at gmail.com>
>
> *Date:*2021-02-18 05:57:28
>
> *Subject:*Re: [kictanet] Safaricom changes to home fibre ToS
>
>
>
> Thank you Sidney for this.
>
> I don’t think Safaricom is being sincere in this fair usage limits. They
> promised that with Home Fibre one can stream, download or upload stuff
> without limits. All you do is pay your monthly subscription. Fair usage is
> a type of rationing that limits how much you can do when you had been
> promised that you can do whatever you want. To me this is going back on a
> promise. It’s reminiscent of the days of unlimited 3GB bundles on the
> dongle modem only for them to strike you with a fair usage notice. Are
> other networks doing the same? As the industry leader in the country, this
> is bound to influence other industry players to adopt the same standards
> and limits which is not good. Maybe it might be time to seek other options.
>
>
>
> Regards
>
> Beryl
>
>
>
> Sent from my iPad
>
>
> On 16 Feb 2021, at 9:47 PM, Mwendwa Kivuva via kictanet <
> kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke> wrote:
>
> Thanks Sidney for initiating this debate.
>
>
>
> On Tue, 16 Feb 2021 at 19:44, Sidney Ochieng via kictanet <
> kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke> wrote:
>
> Listers,
>
> Not sure if you've seen the stir online of changes to the ToS with
> Safaricom's home offering.
>
> Safaricom is destroying Home Fibre with new ‘Fair Usage’ Limits:
> https://tech-ish.com/2021/02/14/safaricom-is-destroying-home-fibre-with-new-fair-usage-limits/
>
>
>
> The response from the company has been disappointing in the extreme,
> misleading with statistics and suggesting that it's best customers are
> thieves <https://twitter.com/Safaricom_Care/status/1360876964651929600>,
> never mind that working for home has lead to increased demand and use of
> their services.
>
>
>
> That tweet certainly does not call resellers thieves. It calls them
> resellers.
>
>
>
>
>
> All this is beside the point, at least for this forum, what I'm concerned
> about this that if we didn't have an eagle-eyed blogger looking out for
> this, it would have been completely missed until it was already in place.
>
>
>
> So I have a few of questions:
>
>    1. Does the CA have any policies around ToS changes around services
>    under their purview and how they are communicated to users?
>
> CA has a consumer and public affairs department. Here is what they have to
> say about ToC ( CA/CPA/CEP/B/05/2014 )
> https://ca.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Consumer-Rights-and-Responsibilities.pdf
>
>
>
>
> Perhaps CA should update that information. It is 6 years old. But good
> information nevertheless.
>
>
>    1. Should companies that run what could be considered critical
>    infrastructure be allowed to arbitrarily change their ToS to apply
>    retroactively especially if it's to the detriment of their customers?
>
> I hope lawyers here can help us with this.
>
>
>    1.
>    2. If customers choose not to accept a change in ToS what redress do
>    they have given that perhaps the provider is the only one available in
>    their area.
>    3. Finally, given that we know this could all be avoided if there was
>    more competition in the fibre market, what is the CA doing to make it so
>    that we have more competition in that area? It's concerning that Safaricom
>    seems to only option for home connections in several places
>
>  Determined by the market and economic forces. Just the other day,
> Safaricom was not in the home fibre market. What they have provided are
> more options for consumers. Numbers are stubborn facts. Fixed data
> subscription is as follows: Data source CA, July -September 2020 period,
> page 19
> https://ca.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Sector-Statistics-Report-Q1-2020-2021.pdf
>
>  Safaricom PLC 229,406 subscribers, 35.6% market share
>
> Wananchi Group (Kenya) Ltd* 202,237 subscribers , 31.4 35.6% market share
>
>  Jamii Telecommunications Ltd 127,914  subscribers , 19.8 Poa  % market
> share
>
>  Internet Kenya Ltd 56,824  subscribers ,8.8% market share
>
>  Mawingu Networks Ltd 11,087 subscribers, 1.7 % market share
>
>  Internet Solutions Kenya Ltd 9,228  subscribers, 1.4 % market share
>
>
>
> Consumers are speaking with their wallets.
>
>
>
> As a policy discussion list, probably what we should be asking is what is
> the fair cost for certain broadband packages, and whether there is anything
> that can be really unlimited. Wearing my competent network engineer hat, I
> can tell you even at Safaricom, they don't have unlimited bandwidth.
> Bandwidth is a limited resource to the extent of the network devices,
> network media, and cost of acquiring and delivering that bandwidth to your
> edge device.
>
>
>
> Best Regards
>
> ______________________
> Mwendwa Kivuva, Nairobi, Kenya
>
> https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwendwa-kivuva
>
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>
> The Kenya ICT Action Network (KICTANet) is a multi-stakeholder platform
> for people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and
> regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT
> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>
> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
> online that you follow in real life: respect people's times and bandwidth,
> share knowledge, don't flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do
> not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
>

-- 
Barrack O. Otieno
+254721325277
+254733206359
Skype: barrack.otieno
PGP ID: 0x2611D86A
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