Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has shared the performance of mobile operators in three cities – Lucknow, Ahmedabad and Kanpur – after conducting drive test.

IMRB International or Phistream Consulting has carried out independent drive test to assess quality of service (QoS) for mobile telephone services in these cities covering various locations.

TRAI conducted the drive test over a distance of 150 – 350 km to assess the network condition more specifically in terms of Radio Frequency (RF) Coverage; Rx Quality; Call Setup Success Rate; Call Drop; Voice Quality; Blocked calls; and Carrier to Interference ratio.

TRAI measured performance of Bharti Airtel, Aircel, Idea Cellular, Vodafone India, Reliance Communications, BSNL, Telenor and Tata Docomo across various technologies such as 2G, 3G and CDMA.

Lucknow
TRAI said all mobile operators have met the Call Setup Success Rate benchmark of ~9S percent. All the operators have met the Blocked Call Rate benchmark of 3 percent. Majority of the operators are meeting the Call Drop Rate benchmark of 52 percent except BSNL 2G and Reliance CDMA. Most of the telecom operators are not meeting Rx Quality benchmark of ~9S percent except Airtel 3G, Aircel 2G and 3G, ldea 3G, Vodafone 2G and 3G and BSNL 3G.

Ahmedabad
The TRAI report said all telecom operators have met the Call Setup Success Rate benchmark of 95 percent except Reliance Communications CDMA. Most of the telecom operators have met the Call Block Rate benchmark of 3 percent except Aircel 2G, BSNL 2G and 3G, Reliance Communications 2G and CDMA and Vodafone 2G Networks. All the mobile operators have failed to meet the Call Drop Rate benchmark of >2 percent expect Airtel 2G. Most of the operators have failed to meet the Rx Quality benchmark of 95 percent except Airtel 2G and 3G, Idea Cellular 3G and Vodafone 3G.

Kanpur
All mobile operators have met the Call Setup Success Rate benchmark of ~95 percent. All the mobile operators have met the Blocked Call Rate benchmark of 3 percent. Majority of the operators are meeting the Call Drop Rate benchmark of >2 percent except BSNL 2G and 3G and Reliance CDMA. Most of the operators are not meeting Rx Quality benchmark of ~95 percent except Airtel 3G, Aircel 3G, Idea 2G, Vodafone 2G and 3G, BSNL 3G and Telenor 2G.

TRAI’s test drive is aimed at encouraging telecoms to reduce call drops. Telecom minister Ravi Shankar Prasad recently said telecoms are taking enough action to reduce call drops.