TM Guest Editorial

Give Us Durable Handsets, Not ToysCellcos need to focus on needs of road warriors The following guest editorial is based on a recent letter to Bell Mobility by Don Spencer, General Services Manager, Yamaha Motor Canada Ltd. It’s time to speak out on a topic where I have had to say some harsh words recently to both my wireless handset supplier and Bell Mobility. I can relate to a story few years ago in Telemanagement where a telecom manager said, "I can manage my land-based telecom with minimal time and effort, but cellular uses hours and hours of my time." (See Telemanagement #165) The quality and durability of today’s cellphone handsets is questionable. The manufacturers are now making toys rather than durable business-quality handsets. We have had many problems with both call reception quality and handset life over the past 12-18 months.I had been beating up on my dealer rep for a while, when really the frustration should be directed at the carrier. So I wrote Bell Mobility recently. I thanked it for providing me with eligibility to replace those snazzy but problematic Audiovox 8600 phones. And advised them that on websites rating cellphones, I have never seen a worse rating on a phone before than the one for the 8600. Workhorses or Toys?It’s not just that; it’s the overall hardware product offering made to Bell’s existing customers when they want to replace or upgrade a phone. It has become very difficult to find a phone that is better than a toy.We need phones that are work related. We need workhorses that provide road warriors with phones that can stand up to the grind just as individuals do on a day-to-day basis. The delicate "flower" phones (oh they are pretty) just do not cut it. When we came to Bell from Cantel nine years ago, we were using Motorola DPC 650 phones. I am about to replace the last of them. The DPC 650 is large, cumbersome, heavy. It worked again and again and again. My field staff still ask for them. We were then introduced to the Qualcomm phones. The Qualcomm 2760 was the best phone ever offered—I still have people asking me if we can get them one. I have guys here going to flea markets to get chargers for these old phones. They do not want a new phone that is just a toy. The phones we get now have digital cameras, and ringtones—just how many different ringtones do you need to answer a phone? I already have a PC to surf the web, and I have both a car stereo and home stereo and, yes, a Walkman too, so my cellphone doesn’t need radio and music. I have an Xbox, so games are not required. And I don’t want cute cartoon characters watching the sun go up and down—that’s why we have TV. I don’t need an AM/FM/CD dual cassette phone. Give Us True PhonesWhat we need are true phones with a few dozen speed dials. Voice dial is great, and it’s good to be able to plug in a headset, take a message, and use buttons that fingers are not too big for. And oh yes, let’s have displays big enough so I don’t need my reading glasses to see who I am calling, especially at night in my car beside the highway. Maybe I am out to lunch but I think Bell Mobility could sell a lot of phones like that, especially if they can be used to block a trailer wheel the way we did with the DPC 650s. (They worked well as substitute hammers too.) I hope Bell passed along my information to the kids in their product planning department so they can get a feel for what the real purpose of a phone is—to place and accept telephone calls. I think they have forgotten this somewhere along the way. The cellular industry seems to have lost touch with its roots—the business customers, who remain the most stable segment of their installed base. In my opinion, business users would gladly pay the full, unsubsidized cost of a phone if it would last three to five years.

TM Guest Editorial

News | March 4, 2005

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