UPDATE: Apparently Opera Mini for BlackBerry 6.5 had some compatibility issues with BlackBerry OS 6.0 and this has now been fixed with a teeny weeny upgrade of the application. Opera Mini now works on the Etisalat Nigeria network using BIS ;-).
Glo internet services in the country have been erratic of late and I pretty much doubt that things would get better soon despite the recent NCC warning.
There was even a time their services went down for 1 week over here in Sokoto and despite admitting to this lapse in quality of service, nobody was compensated just as it is with other mobile network operators. They lose money and transfer the cost to you the consumer.
Only God knows if their free browsing data offer is to blame for this as some folks have been awarded as much as 100GB of data and I find this bizarre considering this offer was just launched a few months ago and one would ought to have recharged as much as N200,000 ($1250) to get such free data allowance.
The folks at Artwales and Mobility Nigeria aren’t also impressed with their services of late too.
I decided to give Etisalat Nigeria a go on my Blackberry since of all the cellular networks in my area, their internet services was the most stable.
With no indication of limitations on their website, I went ahead and subscribed for their monthly BIS which costs N3,000.
It was smooth sailing all the way with the speed being better than Glo. This was until I noticed that my call credit balance was gradually depleting. Shocked, I shut down all apps on my phone and checked my settings for Ubersocial for BlackBerry as it was one of the few apps on my blackberry that could make use of Wi-Fi, TCP, BIS or BES. It was set to BIS and thus couldn’t be using up my credit.
I launched Opera Mini and did like 5 minutes of surfing only to check my balance to see that N20 bucks was gone already. All calls to Etisalat customer care and a visit to their experience center here in Sokoto confirmed one thing:
YOU CAN NOT USE OPERA MINI ON YOUR BLACKBERRY WITHOUT A DATA PLAN.
This is one hell of a wrong move on the part of Etisalat Nigeria. It’s a known fact that the BlackBerry browser is practically useless and other browsers like Bolt and UC Browser don’t integrate seamlessly with the BlackBerry OS and not as fast as Opera Mini.
For those of you interested in subscribing to one of Etisalat Nigeria’s BlackBerry Plans, do please take note of the following.
- There’s no data allowance like Glo but Unlimited data has not been confirmed.
- There’s no way of checking data balance or subscription validity period
- You must buy a separate data plan to make use of Opera Mini and some other apps. I’m presently considering buying the N1,000 data bundle.
RECOMMENDATION TO THE MANAGEMENT OF ETISALAT NIGERIA
Considering the fact that most BB users don’t even consume as much as 1GB in a month, it wouldn’t hurt for you to offer us 100MB of data included in the package for use with apps that don’t support your BIS.
Paying N4,000 a month to use my BlackBerry on your network ain’t beans oh! That’s quite expensive!
I just hope Opera Mini sometime in the future adds a feature that allows blackberry subscribers to choose which network use just like UC Browser does
I’ll be reluctantly moving back to GLO once the month is over 
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