CityCell, take a bow

Last year I bought two CityCell Prepaid connections with just 2,600 Taka. I wanted to avail the lowest FnF rate in the market. Likewise, a couple of buddies of mine did the same. They too wanted to take an advantage of the best FnF tariff by CityCell. Afterwards, more and more mates of mine were doing the same as it reduced the amount of load we had to take while talking to our would-be better-halves. Within a couple of months I watched a number of students were using a CityCell besides their regular cellular. They would say, Ah! It’s just a Personal Mobile.

We were charged an amount of 25 Paisa (0.25 Taka)!! whole day long! No more waiting to get 12:00AM on the clock, starting to change the SIM cards, and then talk, talk and talk! No more overcrowding of too many calls right after the clock said it was 12, the long yearning midnight! We used to talk all day, all night. Who had sometime to study, to think, to do something or to get some good night sleep then? Moreover, the lines would remain always clear, i.e. no hanging around to get the line free or something like that. We talked in the morning, in the afternoon and obviously at night when there was not even a ghost to bother us!

Let me state an example of how CityCell lessened our load. I have a buddy in my department at the University. His name is J. This guy talked about 700 hours (To be more precise, 680 Hours) with his CityCell to a single number (FnF). Now let’s do some calculations. The average FnF rates charged by other companies at that time was Taka 0.80 + 15% VAT which made it Taka 0.92/min a call. So, 680 hours x 60 = 40,800mins. And (40,800mins x Taka 0.92) = Taka 37,536! If he did not use CityCell he would have been mad by now. Now, what was his actual cost then? 40,800mins x Taka 0.28 = Taka 10,510 only! Amazing, hmm?

CityCell also relieved some of our worries at times. Those of us used mobile phone sets valued more than Taka 15,000 used to take with us the CityCell mobile during night travels. In case some offenders took an interest in snatching away our mobiles, we would happily give away our CityCell to them. A lot of parents had worries that their child made phone calls all the evening and shitted on his/her studies day after day. Therefore, sweet child of theirs used Plan B, i.e. handing over his/her regular phone to them, then locking his/her door and starting to talk with CityCell. Oh! God, you are too good, they kept saying.

But on the other end of the scale we had problems too. Some of us were tired of keeping two mobiles simultaneously. Some of us could not afford to maintain both mobiles at a time. The problem was not with CityCell’s services, but with its RIM cards. They do no fit in any GSM sets since they were made to support CDMA technology only. None of us could use a single set for using two services all together. Thus, there was a chaos. As a result, we were waiting for a GSM based company to open door for us. We waited… … …

Then came Warid. Just a few days [From November 19, 2007] back it has opened doors for us. Now we have similar or even less rates to avail. With its heavy initiatives Warid is going to set itself into our very hearts soon, very soon. 5 FnFs to any operator with alluring tariffs and other hot & cool features, what else anybody need? Eventually, we had a chance to get rid of CityCell and other SIM cards, and get set with Warid enjoying its startling tariffs.

Is it time for CityCell to bend for a while. Can it provide its customers with more cool services than other GSM mobile operators? We’ll have to wait and see. A new CEO has been appointed and a whole new team is working tirelessly to make some new advancements. Whether it will win people’s hearts or get trashed is yet to be forecasted. Let the pros bother about that. What concerns me most is that I need Taka 0.25 only to make a phone call to my near and dear ones. I don’t have to bother carrying two mobile phones anymore. I am pretty pleased now.