F-You, Maxis!

[jeffooi]

And Jamaluddin Ibrahim, F-You too!

Nobody can ever come close to Maxis.net for being the best ISP in Malaysia - Best for cherry-picking to benefit thyself.

This evening, the Consumer Product unit at Maxis.Net started to transmit email notices to its dial-up subscribers:

As of 31st October 2003, Maxis will no longer provide Internet dial-up access service.

The good news is that we will continue to provide Maxis net Portal services. Hence, your e-mail account, photo album, storage and other Portal privileges will not be affected by this move. [...]

Due to this change Maxis have migrated your original dial-up package plans to Portal Access package at RM7 per month. Please login here to make payment to continue your Portal Access subscription.

To affected subscribers, including this blogger who has been paying RM10 per month just for a dial-up back-up, Maxis has this to offer, call it value creation or value destruction however you see it:

As part of our commitment to you and in recognition of your loyal support, we have made an exclusive arrangement with Jaring (ISP), for you to sign up for Internet dial-up services and enjoy savings of up to RM35.

Maxis.Net further justifies its service termination by hard-selling that its Portal Access service offers customers the following benefits at RM7 per month.

• Email storage of 40MB.


• Photo album services @ 30 MB.


• FREE 70 online SMS worth RM10.50.


• Match Making service with Heartclicks.


• E-cards, Personalisation service from updated news to entertainment.

Jamaluddin 'F-You' Ibrahim should know that there are Internet users who don't need a photo album or a match-making service. We are not the Yahoo generation. We just need a F-You' back-up for dial-up.

Would MCMC walk away from this and let Malaysia's digital vision be left at the mercy of two dial-up ISPs: TM Net and Jaring?

Right now, I could only think of one thing that MCMC should do tomorrow: Suspend Maxis' broadband provisioning licence until it puts back the dial-up service.

[sinleong]

I have a friend developer who a few years ago managed to get Maxis to come in and provide telephony services to the township he was developing. His company even built the exchange and did the cabling for Maxis. And at the last minute, Maxis pulled out citing that the telephony business was not profitable. Then, Telekom Malaysia had to come in.

This is the problem with these new service providers these days. They do not have the social responsibility at all. While campaigning hard for the lucrative business customers, they leave the residential and rural areas to Telekom Malaysia, who have no choice but to pick them up. Telekom's revenue has been hit very hard since then and the consumers in the end have to suffer price increases.

With this type of attitude, our Malaysian market is still not ready for a competitive telecommunications market. Truly, Malaysia tak boleh!

[jericho]

Jeff,

You might want to lodge an official complaint with MCMC. They are quite helpful when comes to consumer proctection.

Just few weeks ago, I made a complaint on TIME.com on their TIME Gold products through MCMC and a few days later I received a letter cc to me from MCMC requesting TIME.com to looks into the complaint.

[forknspoon]

Its more like kadang-kadang boleh, kadang-kadang tak boleh. Mana boleh!!?

Since we have a CAP for consumer products, why not have a consumer watchdog for ICT issues, and especially in an oligarchy telecommunications environment?

And since some parties have already been granted license, lobby for criteria such as social responsibility and so on for renewal of license. Thou shalt annoy just as ye hath been annoyed!

[jericho]

forknspoon,

for your info, Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC ) is the regulator for the converging communications and multimedia industry.

MCMC is overseeing the industries based on Economic regulation, Technical regulation, Consumer protection and
Social regulation.


Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission

[forknspoon]

Thanks Jericho. *blush blush* i obviously have been way out of touch!

Have read about their content forum (quite a while back) in the papers and did not follow mcmc news after that. So...ahem..never quite got to the consumer part

Did check out the link and I'm quite surprised that such a lot of effort have been put in to support consumer rights, and quite organised to!

With the mechanisms in place, why then are there so many problems unresolved or repeated? Perhaps there are many ignorant consumers like me who don't know how to make a collective voice (and not just as an individual with a specific problem) loud enough to affect corporate direction?

And granted that in the past people have made enuf noise for media pick-up, which resulted in some general improvements, but ultimately, they are not motivated enough to move out of medicore mode since we have no choice but to depend on the few.

At the end of the day, it's MCMC vs Profit. It would be interesting to see what comes out of it. And since I am not very familiar with the org., are they really, really independent (yeah, in Malaysia)? Or is this like a wrestling match, orchestrated to provide false comfort?

Sorry...cynicism comes with age! Thanks for keeping this old woman updated

[Joecool]

I wonder if this move away from dial-up is actually a prelude to a push for broadband? Maybe and just a big maybe, after the acquistion of Time - MAXIS may just want to venture into the market that TMnet is in? After all these days CONTENT is KING. And Maxis cannot do much if all its subcribers are using 56K lines. Those low revenue people who cannot switch to broadband are advised therefore to switch to Jaring. Interesting isn't it? Just go for the cream of the pie and leave the crust to anyone else who wants it. And of course this is just my observation/theory.

[sinleong]

Maxis only acquired the mobile business of Time. All fixed line and isp business is retained by Time dotCom and Time net

[Joecool]

Sinleong - you are right. I stand corrected. Just thought I mention what I thought would be a good business reason for them to do what they are doing. Maybe it is just not profitable for them or the profit is too little for them to maintain it. Guess this means I will be giving up my MAXIS id as well.

[xweird]

Right now, I could only think of one thing that MCMC should do tomorrow: Suspend Maxis' broadband provisioning licence until it puts back the dial-up service.

I doubt anyone would be saying this if it was TMnet that announcced that they were going to discontinue their dial-up services....

If you guys are really disatisfied, you can lodge a complaint with MCMC, but my guess is that the big guns Maxis have alerady informed and garnered MCMC's approval for this move.

Rm0.02

[Joecool]

I guess with A. Krishna behind MAXIS, not much anyone can do these days.

[Almighty]

It is not because of Ananda behind Maxis...its because who is behind Ananda !!!!

[Joecool]

That too. After all like the Chinese say, when you beat a dog you must remember who is the owner.

[TepenPucong]

Maxis is really really really f**cker. Just view these new sms rate (I got this from the hotlink website) :-

Maxis to Maxis – RM0.10

Maxis to Other Local Operators - RM0.20

International SMS - RM0.50

Maxis to Info / Content SMS Request - RM0.15

Notes:
Maxis to Maxis - applicable for 012 and 017 numbers

Other Local Operators – applicable for 019, 013, 016, 010 and
Fixed line)


Why don't they just stick to the old flat rate of 15 sen for every sms.

Why do they do such a thing in Malaysia?
If there is a thing that are highly in used, they will simply increase the charges without any reasonable reason.

Just look at our public transport services, they will keep increasing the fares with excused that the parts, services will be modernised but after the hike, nothing change.

[Joecool]

I guess market forces applies. If you are not happy with MAXIS, then switch to Digi or Celcom? Does come with the inconvienience of informing everyone of your new number. I wish they implement the generic universal phone number like in HK where you can carry your number with you when you switch operator. Of course that will mean all mobile number is 8 digits in length but that still is better than dialing 012 xxx xxxx which is 10 digits.