The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has issued a new directive mandating telecom operators to publicly notify consumers of major service disruptions via media platforms, as part of a wider effort to improve transparency, service quality, and consumer protection in the telecom sector.
According to a statement by Nnenna Ukoha, Acting Head of Public Affairs at the NCC, the directive requires operators to clearly disclose the cause of any outage, affected locations, and estimated restoration time. For planned disruptions, operators must inform subscribers at least one week in advance.
Operators must also compensate affected users—such as by extending service validity—based on the Consumer Code of Practice Regulations.
“By providing consumers and stakeholders in the telecommunications industry with timely and transparent information on network outages, we are entrenching a culture of accountability and transparency,” said Edoyemi Ogor, NCC’s Director of Technical Standards and Network Integrity.
Ogor revealed that the move follows months of testing a Major Outage Reporting Portal with telecom companies. The initiative aligns with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s Executive Order designating telecom infrastructure as Critical National Information Infrastructure (CNII).
The Commission outlined three key categories of reportable outages:
- Fibre cuts or network-related issues affecting at least 5% of subscribers or five or more LGAs.
- Unplanned outages affecting 100+ sites or 5% of an operator’s infrastructure, or isolating a cluster for over 30 minutes.
- Significant degradation of service in any of Nigeria’s top 10 traffic-heavy states.
All major outages must be reported through the Commission’s Major Outage Reporting Portal, now publicly accessible on the NCC website. The portal publishes details and causes of each reported incident.
Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), Internet Service Providers (ISPs), and other last-mile service providers are required to comply. Outages exceeding 24 hours must be accompanied by proportional compensation to subscribers.
The NCC reiterated its commitment to strengthening network integrity, national security, and consumer satisfaction in Nigeria’s evolving digital economy.
