Mobistar, one of Belgium's telephone companies
The global economic crisis that followed the 11 September attacks was so severe that many companies went bankrupt, and those that survived are still recovering.
One such company that has lost many of its customers and is still losing is the telephone company 'Mobistar'. As the telecommunication market increased, it became a competition.
Many are offering better and affordable rates to target customers. Apart from Mobistar are other phone companies such as Ortel, Base, Proximus, Belgacom, and Lyca.
Many users, especially foreigners who communicate with families at long distances, started shifting from Mobistar, whose call rates are very expensive compared to other affordable telephone companies.
Take 'Lyca' for example, someone can use a 5 Euros credit to speak to his family in Africa, for about ten minutes, and still have a leftover call credit of about 2 Euros 50 cents.
This is totally impossible with Mobistar, even if one buys 15 Euros worth of credit card. Because of this problem, many foreigners face, many consider buying credit from Mobistar a waste of money.
Those using Mobistar have no choice but to buy a 5 Euro credit once a month or in two months.
After a series of warnings from Mobistar that they will suspend my number, an act to intimidate users to buy credit, they finally suspended the number 0497/024967, which I have used for the past thirteen years.
If Mobistar thinks this is a good strategy to lure users to buy credit, then I am sorry they are wasting their time; moreover, they are going to lose a lot of customers more than ever.
Why would one buy credit worth 15 Euros but can't speak to his family in Africa for ten minutes, when 5 Euros from Lyca can do the job?
Suspending my number can't intimidate me into going running to any of the Mobistar offices to negotiate or buy a credit.
Thanks to the amazing discovery of the internet and Skype, I will send my new number to my family within a few days.