13 Oct 2011

Mobile providers to compensate BlackBerry users

Mobile phone providers are expected to compensate customers using BlackBerry models after millions of users worldwide were left without text communication services for three days.

BlackBerry - Reuters

Users of the smartphone in Europe, the Middle East, Africa (EMEA), India and the Americas were affected by a patchy email service and had no access to browsing and messaging.

Research in Motion (RIM), the company which makes the handset, said there had been a “significant improvement” on Thursday.

But service operators in Britain are all in discussions to agree a compensation package for BlackBerry customers, with the money set to copme from RIM itself.

A spokesman for the company told Channel 4 News: “There is a structure in place to compensate (mobile phone operators) for service interruption, which in turn they could pass on to customers. It is something we are talking about, but we are working with our partners to get the service back to a level that customers have come to expect from us.”

Spokespeople for Vodafone, O2, Orange and T-Mobile said that they were reviewing their options on compensation for users.

It is believed that reimbursements will vary from country to country.

In the Gulf, two operators – du and Etisalat – have both announced they will be offering three days free service.

‘No preferential treatment’

Meanwhile, RIM insists it is not giving preferential treatment to its business customers in the country as it tries to get back to normal service.

The spokesman said it was standard practice to provide updates on an hour-by-hour basis to larger business customers, “given our direct relationship with them.”

On Thursday morning, the company announced it had made “significant improvement” to its services.

Read more: What's happening with my BlackBerry Q and A

In a statement, it said: “From 6am BST today, all services across Europe, the Middle East and Africa, as well as India, have been operating with significant improvement.

“We continue to monitor the situation 24×7 to ensure ongoing stability. Thank you for your patience.”

Apologising for interruptions and delays, RIM’s chief information officer Robin Bienfait previously said on the company’s website: “You’ve depended on us for reliable, real-time communications, and right now we’re letting you down.

“We are taking this very seriously and have people around the world working around the clock to address this situation.

“We believe we understand why this happened and we are working to restore normal service levels in all markets as quickly as we can.”