Pushing Carriers To Reveal Coverage Maps
People have been talking about it for years, and NY City is trying to create its own such maps (with marginal success), but the calls are now getting louder to force the wireless carriers to reveal their coverage maps. They know where they have coverage, and many feel that consumers deserve to have that info in making their purchasing decisions. As this article points out, some of the carriers have no problem sharing the info when it benefits them – such as to sell a large business user – but still refuse to reveal the info to retail customers. By now, the carriers should realize that this is likely to backfire on them until laws are passed forcing them to reveal this info. So, now, the question is which carrier will play the role of Verizon Wireless in the portability issue by “embracing” the change towards openness with respect to coverage. Whichever carrier is the first is most likely to get the net benefit of the decision – assuming they have reasonable coverage.
