Aircel Shutdown Shows New Portability Innovation

Aircel Shutdown Shows New Portability Innovation

If you are commuting along the Jaydev Vihar road towards Kalinga Hospital, it is impossible not to notice a crowd of people bundled on the pavement across the Fortune Towers. A closer look and you see motorbikes parked in a queue with an umbrella perched atop, which is branded with various names of mobile networks.

These ‘portable kiosks’ have come in the wake of the Aircel network shutdown since last month. Since the company is allegedly facing financial crisis and almost on the verge of bankruptcy, more and more customers are porting their numbers to different networks.

Owing to the large number of portable requests, several network outlets have set up their ‘motorbike-kiosks’ in front of Fortune Towers, the local Aircel office in Bhubaneswar.

“We started these kiosks on March 5. A number of Aircel customers are facing problems, since their numbers have completely stopped working. So we thought of setting up a kiosk in front of Aircel office itself, so that the customers can easily apply for number portability once they come to complain,” says an Airtel kiosk operator.Mobile networks ranging from Idea, Vodafone, Airtel, BSNL and Tata Docomo have set up more than 25 kiosks and are offering attractive talktime plans. Initially curious, more and more customers have now started dropping in, and the place continues to be crowded though it has almost been a week since they became operational.

“We get around 20 to 25 customers on a daily basis. Since there are so many kiosks, the process is expedited and there are no hassles,” says another Vodafone kiosk operator.

For mobile number portability, a customer just needs to approach them and provide the Aadhar number. The operators generate the porting code using an application. After the thumbprint is taken for Aadhar validation, the customer gets the confirmation about portability request. The number from the new network starts functioning in seven working days.

The quick and easy procedure has impressed several customers, who were disgruntled after facing call drops and no connectivity for a long time.“The best part about these kiosks is we can easily check the best available plans from all the top-notch networks and decide our preference. Had these kiosks not been set up here, we had to individually go to different network outlets to clear our doubts. Also, things happen instantly here, we don’t have to worry about anything,” says Shiba Sundar Bal, who ported his number to Tata Docomo after using Aircel for five years.

These kiosks open around 10am and close around 5pm.

Pictures by: Rakesh Kumar Roul