NAIROBI, Kenya, Jan 17 – Airtel Kenya and Telkom are the two least performing networks in Kenya, according to the Communication Authority of Kenya (CA).
The latest CA report on quality-of-service (QoS) performance for the 2022–23 financial year measured operators on parameters such as network performance, quality of service, quality of experience, and end-to-end quality of service.
Overall, Telkom performed badly, with 65 percent, followed by Airtel at 79 percent.
“Airtel Kenya Networks and Telkom Kenya failed to, not only meet their coverage targets, but a number of the most critical QoS KPIs, and particularly the “Unsuccessful Call Ratio” and Data Internet KPIs which is an indicator for coverage and internet availability/accessibility respectively,” CA data reads.
“Aging BTSs and Sparse deployment of BTS is the major contributing factor to the failure by Airtel and Telkom Kenya to meet the KPI thresholds.”
Safaricom, however, was number one at 90 percent.
The survey, which took place in 44 counties, borrowed a leaf from the consumer satisfaction and perception survey that was conducted and reported by April 2023.
Safaricom received a 100 percent rating in Mombasa, Kwale, Lamu, Nairobi, Busia, Kiambu, and Nyandarua counties, while it recorded the least rating of 63.64 percent in Vihiga and Kajiado.
Safaricom is the largest telco in Kenya in terms of customer base, which stands at about 43.7 percent of the entire market share in Kenya.
On the other hand, the Airtel network performed better at 90.91 percent in the counties of Mombasa, Machakos, Nyandarua, Muranga, Nakuru, Kericho, Siaya, Homa Bay, Migori, and Nairobi.
In Baringo and Laikipia, it recorded a rating of 45.5 percent.
Likewise, Telkom Kenya Limited performed better in Vihiga, Mombasa, Nairobi, and Nakuru devolved units at 72.73 percent, while the lowest score was 36.36 percent in Muranga and Laikipia counties.
Telkom was the lowest in terms of both data services and coverage of the signal.
