The majority of individual consumers and companies use electronic communications services supported on GSM/UMTS/LTE mobile communication systems to meet their everyday communication needs, in particular as far as telephony, messages and data are concerned, including emergency and security communications, reason for which these systems play a very relevant in the context of national electronic communications.
In the scope of GSM/UMTS/LTE mobile communication systems, quality of service from the user’s perspective is of the utmost importance, especially on account of the radio nature of access, for the mobility they allow and the take-up rate they show.
On the other hand, National Regulatory Authorities throughout the European Union must also monitor and ensure access to open Internet and promote the continuous availability of non-discriminatory Internet access services, with levels of quality that reflect technological progress.
ANACOM, in the scope of its assignments and using the powers provided for in its Statutes, is entitled to arrange for independent studies of assessment of quality of service from the user’s perspective to be conducted, so as to provide the market, especially the most vulnerable consumers - individuals and micro and small companies -, with fair information on the performance of electronic communications services supported on mobile communication systems available on the market.
The monitoring of the performance of mobile networks and services, carried out with commercial terminal equipment and from a common user’s perspective, is an inclusive, extremely accurate and reliable process, that provides information on the geographic coverage and quality of service made available by GSM/UMTS/LTE operators. The intrusive approach of this method is acknowledged to be the best possible commitment between the feasibility of its technical implementation, the guarantee of user privacy and the accurateness and reliability of information achieved. As such, field-testing, using teams of technical experts and automatic testing systems, in particular motion-based approaches - drive tests and walk tests - allows for objective measuring and accurate definition of analysed geographic areas. It also allows services to be analysed independently of the operation of telecommunication networks themselves. For example, areas with poor or even no radio coverage may also be considered in the analysis, the results of the study thus becoming a good indicator of the overall network behaviour from the user’s perspective. This is also the best method to conduct operator performance benchmarks, as it guarantees that tests are made under equal and simultaneous conditions for all.
This document presents a set of indicators for assessing the performance of the most relevant services, in the current context of mobile networks, and for checking coverage of each radio technology used by operators. Measurement profiles are also shown, defining a set of commitments and conditions which must be ensured to correctly assess the quality of service and to guarantee the reliability of tests. These profiles also cover the standardization of procedures and the definition of testing and measuring parameters, to allow the feasibility of analyses and the comparability of results obtained.
