Telephone service subscribers in the country may have finally found succour as telecom companies have started paying customers for bad network service.
This development followed a direction by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to require carriers to pay subscribers for non-performance on quality standards between November 2025 and January 2026.
The Guardian says that Airtel Nigeria, the telecom company with over 63.6 million users as of the first quarter of 2026, has sent SMS alerts to inform eligible customers about the compensation.
The notification said compensation had been applied and could be validated with a USSD code. But in many cases the amounts were paltry, from as low as N167 to roughly N295.
Dear customer, compensation airtime has been credited to you for service quality issues (Nov 2025-Jan 2026). To check, dial *310#. “Thanks.
The amount varies with usage and location, but clients have received credits ranging from N167 to over N500. Most reimbursements are below the N1,000 threshold.
It filtered information this week that MTN Nigeria has been compensating consumers with airtime for bad network quality suffered in January 2026. Affected users received airtime credits from N20 to more than N341.
NCC Executive Vice Chairman Dr Aminu Maida, speaking during a media event in Lagos last month, said the era of simple warnings is past.
This is about providing value back to subscribers who have been given substandard service. “It is not a refund by the regulator but a compliance obligation on service providers,” said Maida.
The payout will apply to service disruptions that occur between November 2025 and January 2026. This “clean credit” can be used for data, calls or SMS and unlike typical promotional bonuses, it has no expiry date.
Subscribers do not need to apply or go to service centers. The NCC has directed operators to automatically detect network problems at the Local Government Area (LGA) level, which is a more detailed level. This is to better reflect the experience of the typical user rather than broad averages.
To be eligible, a subscriber must have been in an impacted LGA and have undertaken a “billed activity” (call, text or data consumption) during the outage time.
And the NCC is calling for major infrastructure investment to prevent future payouts. Maida said carriers had committed to almost 12,000 network upgrades in 2026, compared to just over 300 upgrades last year. One big operator has already committed more than $1 billion in new capital spending.
Many subscribers were happy with the credit, while some questioned the technique. I got N295 A banker in Lagos, Toyin Adekunle, said, “While I appreciate the gesture, does that really cover the value of calls I lost during the festive season?”
Industry analysts said the payments were a success for consumer rights, but said the ultimate goal was better service.
The effectiveness of the policy depends on operators being able to hit key performance benchmarks. Service improvements will dry up the flow of compensation,” said an analyst.
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