The whole world has been thrown into precautionary mode because of the spread of the deadly COVID-19 virus. Everybody is taking precautions and enforcing measures that will prevent the further spread of the virus. Many countries are on ‘lockdown’ and even others are practicing social distancing where the attendance to public events is expected to be very minimal. Citizens have been advised to wear Personal Protective Equipment such as gloves and face masks as they move around in public. This basically means that some businesses would have to close down and start operating again once the pandemic is over. However, work must go on. So, workers are being made to work from home and others who offer essential services like health workers are expected to work unabated.
Working from home requires certain ‘essential’ services. From the twitter chat we held on our twitter page last week, we learnt that some services are required to make one successful in working remotely. These services are electricity and internet service. We need constant supply of electricity to power the devices that we need for work, ie. Laptops, mobile phones etc. Additionally, we need the supply of uninterrupted internet service to remain connected to endless resources available online and also to our colleagues. There are several tools (that are web-based) and websites that help us to collaborate with our colleagues remotely, share ideas and even track the progress of the work we are doing. This makes it very important for us to have access to high speed internet to make it possible for us to work from home seamlessly. It also makes it necessary for us to know which internet service to subscribe to.
We conducted a simple poll on twitter to find out the opinions of our followers on which of the internet services offered by the telecommunication companies in the country is the most expensive. In the list were MTN, Vodefone, Aritel/Tigo and Glo. The results are found below:
Which telecommunication network in Ghana has the most expensive data/internet package? Why?
— Mobile Web Ghana (@MobileWebGhana) April 23, 2020
We had 42 people in total voting and over 78% of them, which is approximately 32 people, voted MTN’s internet service as the most expensive. The remaining 10 people voted for Vodafone. Nobody voted for either Airtel/Tigo or Glo. There is one comment that came as a reply to the tweet that we need to take into consideration before any conclusions are drawn on this matter. The person stated that although MTN’s internet data package is the most expensive, it is also the most reliable so to him it is worth it. As much as we need constant internet service to work effectively from home, we need to bear in mind that we need the service that gives us value for our money. This is a matter of choice and it is also a matter of experience. I hope we all choose wisely which data package from which telecommunication company to use while we work from home.
Though MTN is expensive, it’s worth it
— AJ Antwi (@mxftbizzy) April 23, 2020