Some telecommunication subscribers in Lagos on Tuesday condemned the high interest on data loan services from telecommunication operators in the country.
The residents expressed their dissatisfaction in separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria, monitored by naijabusiness.com.ng in Lagos.
Most of the residents bemoaned the high charges and informed the correspondents that some of the telecom operators in the country charge as much as 15 percent on data loans given to their customers.
Mr. Habeeb Olusanjo, a telecoms subscriber, said the operators did not understand the effect of the present economic situation on the average Nigerian.
“It seems they don’t know what people are going through in the country. I consider it absurd, the same way I feel about borrowing credit on their network,” he said.
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Also speaking, Mr. Collins Adeoluwa, a phone accessories trader at Oyingbo market in Lagos mainland, said that data loan is a good business for telecommunication operators in Nigeria because many people depend on data loan to be active on social media always.
“Some people cannot do without data, to maintain their status on social media they borrow data when they don’t have money for subscription,” he said.
Mrs Folasade Lawal, a cloth trader, said that some business owners cannot afford the effect of running out of data on their businesses, therefore, they do not have a choice than to borrow data when they cannot subscribe irrespective of interest on such data.
“Some business progress depends on availability of data, for advertisement, placing of order, shopping and online banking, I feel that data loan is a huge rip-off on these sets of people,” she said.
Another subscriber, Mr. Kunle Hammed, said that he prefers to buy data from re-sellers which gives him more data at lower cost instead of borrowing data.
