DAMMAM, 21 July 2007 -- A number of citizens are calling on Saudi Telecom Company (STC) and various service-providing companies to provide better DSL services. "We pay a lot of money but we get poor service and technical problems," said one Saudi quoted in a report recently in Al-Watan daily whose name was not given.

"Above all we do not even get compensations for all those cutoffs."

Abdullah Hamad Al-Luwaimi, another DSL customer said he went for the DSL services in an attempt to escape the difficulties and the poor dial-up connection services. But he says his service hasn't gotten much better and that the customer service lines are always busy.

Some citizens complained that these frequent DSL cutoffs have caused them financial losses. Hasan Al-Zahrani said that he relies heavily on Internet connectivity to follow his business and to check on the stock market. He added that he has spent thousands of riyals on Internet DSL service but he would never get a high quality service that he expected.

He compared the situation to that abroad and said, "High speed Internet is available around the world at affordable prices, why is the condition so different in our country?"

The answer to his question may partly be due to the presence of cable television infrastructure in other countries, allowing consumers more options and service providers more competition.

A cable broadband Internet connection (with speeds faster than most expensive home-user accounts available in Saudi Arabia) in the US costs about $45 a month often less than a DSL connection and doesn't require a phone line.

But because Saudi Arabia outlawed cable television and never developed this infrastructure, Saudi consumers do not have this option.

STC refused to comment on the issue. A statement from an Awal-Net (a DSL service provider) marketing manager who blames the technology provider, which in Saudi Arabia's case is STC. "These disconnection are due to the local or the international network," said the statement. "The service-providing company has nothing to do with it."

All DSL providers in Saudi Arabia must use STC's network of phone lines, however connectivity issues may not always be the fault of STC because individual DSL providers have their own technical capabilities and customer service that could be less than satisfactory.

The general manager of Sahara Net, another DSL service provider, says that part of the problem is that demand has exceeded many providers' ability to come through with the service they promise their customers. "These disconnections are due to the high unexpected pressure, resulting from the increasing demand for Internet services," said the official, who was also not cited by name in the Al-Watan report. This pressure he said tends to cause those cutoffs.

However he said that STC shares part of the responsibility. Nonetheless, he advised people with businesses who want to follow the stock market activities to be careful and alert to sudden cutoffs.

The vice president at STC in charge of marketing said: "The capacity of the service-providing company determines the quality of the service they provide."

"The high pressure over the service providing companies tend also to increase the cutoffs," he added, while urging the different service-providing companies to increase their network capacities so as to satisfy the increasing demand over Internet services. He also pointed out that STC is ready to cooperate with these companies to help provide a better network and best DSL service for clients.

Another option for Saudi Internet users is a satellite Internet connection at a considerably higher price, but connection speeds on satellite services never seem to be as high as advertised and are slower than DSL.

For example, Orbit's SatNet connection used by one Arab News staff member that advertises "up to" 512 kilobytes per second downloads and "up to" 128 kbs for uploading never reaches these advertised top speeds. In fact, download speed rarely exceeds 80 kbs at any time of the day (for downloading one file) which is slow by most DSL standards. Several tests done by Arab News on the SatNet connection using a site that checks for connection speed has never shown the download or upload speeds of a SatNet connection to be even close to what is advertised as its top speeds.

© Arab News 2007