TNM Overwhelmed by G-Chat response

VALUE ADDED SERVICES

By Gregory Gondwe, Lilongwe, Malawi

Mobile phone service provider Telecom Networks of Malawi (TNM) limited says most of its subscribers have subscribed to its G-chat service,  which allows internet to mobile texting.

The company says it has been overwhelmed by the positive response to G-Chat, which allows TNM subscribers to chat between a mobile device and a web service in the form of Google email account. 

At the moment those that are benefitting from the product are all prepaid and postpaid TNM subscribers who also have a Gmail Account. 

The only drawback however, is that it is only possible to receive and reply SMS on a handset from a Gmail account holder, but not to originate an SMS.

“To use G-Chat, a Gmail account holder has to register for SMS chats before they can use the service.  The account holder will initiate an SMS chat with another TNM customer,” the statement says.

A user will has 50 ‘credits’ at any point in time and if they exhausted their credits, they just need a single reply from their recipients to get all the 50 credits back. 

The charges are only MK5 per SMS inclusive of Value Added Tax while if a GPRS handset is being used, data charges will apply.