The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has mandated all telecom operators to notify consumers of significant service disruptions through media platforms and provide appropriate compensation in line with regulatory standards.
In a statement issued by Nnenna Ukoha, Acting Head of Public Affairs at the NCC, the Commission emphasized that consumers affected by major outages must receive proportional compensation, such as service validity extensions, as stipulated in the Consumer Code of Practice Regulations.
Operators are now required to disclose key details of service disruptions, including the cause, affected areas, and estimated time for restoration. For planned outages, consumers must be notified at least one week in advance.
This directive is part of the NCC’s broader efforts to improve service quality, enhance consumer experience, and foster transparency in the telecommunications sector.
“The Commission has trialled the reporting process and portal with operators for several months before issuing this directive,” said Edoyemi Ogor, NCC’s Director of Technical Standards and Network Integrity. “By providing timely and transparent information on outages, we are reinforcing accountability and ensuring culprits are held responsible for sabotage or negligence involving telecom infrastructure.”
Ogor added that the initiative aligns with the federal government’s Executive Order recognizing telecom infrastructure as Critical National Information Infrastructure (CNII), underscoring its importance to national security and economic stability.
The directive applies to Mobile Network Operators, Internet Service Providers, and other last-mile service providers. Where outages persist for more than 24 hours, operators must provide compensation in accordance with the Consumer Code of Practice.
The NCC has identified three categories of major network outages. These include: incidents such as fibre cuts, access restrictions, vandalism, theft, or force majeure affecting at least five percent of an operator’s subscriber base or five or more Local Government Areas (LGAs).
Unplanned outages affecting 100 or more sites, or five percent of the total network sites—whichever is lower—or complete loss of a network cluster for 30 minutes or more.
Any outage that significantly degrades service in the top 10 traffic-heavy states as identified periodically by the NCC.
All major outages must be reported through the NCC’s Major Outage Reporting Portal, which is publicly accessible via its official website. The portal provides real-time updates, including causes of disruptions and affected areas.
