Heads of villages in the technological age
Colonel Tran Van Thuan, Director of Viettel Dak Nong, affirmed that one of the most effective customer care services is the free Bulk SMS program that Viettel Dak Nong put into operation in early 2017, free for heads of villages and resident areas in the locality. Le Thanh Hong, head of Sa Da Co village in Quang Tin commune, Dak R’lap district, said, “Previously, to convene meetings or announce new documents, village heads had to go to each household to send letters of invitation. Now heads of villages just send Bulk SMS messages instead. It’s simple and free of charge, extremely convenient, reducing cost while people in the village always get sufficient information in a timely manner and they always join meetings in full numbers. In addition, village heads can also use Bulk SMS service to send greetings messages on the occasion of Tet (Lunar New Year festival) and other celebrations or to remind people of carrying out their civic duty.” Dak Nong now has more than 300 heads of villages and residential areas using free Bulk SMS service provided by Viettel Dak Nong.
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A representative from Viettel Dak Nong talks with people in Dak Mil district about a congenital heart disease |
Recently, Viettel Dak Nong has started cooperation with Dak Nong Electricity to implement the VTBank service helping customers pay electricity bills via the application of BankPlus of Viettel. Using this service, instead of paying their monthly electricity bills in person, people can now use BankPlus on their smartphones to pay the bills, saving time and travel costs. Deputy Sales Manager of Dak Nong Electricity Nguyen Van Trinh said, “With this application and service, Viettel Dak Nong has helped us reduce costs, for we don’t have to send staff to collection points. It also helped reduce the risk for us when bringing cash collected to the head office.”
4G services in the Central Highlands
In December 2017, Viettel Dak Nong and the province’s Association of Farmers implemented the 4G Plus service, helping farmers have easy access to scientific and technological advances in farming, prices of produce, news as well as health knowledge via Viettel 4G SIM cards. Viettel Dak Nong also supports subscribers, especially farmers, via its iCheck smartphone application to check bar codes so that they won’t buy fake goods. Viettel Dak Nong now has the intension of cooperating with the Union of Dak Nong Cooperatives to apply 4G Plus to help bring more scientific and technological utilities to farmer members of 110 cooperatives in the localities.
By boosting customer services, Viettel Dak Nong has succeeded in getting more subscribers. In its early days after establishment in 2004, the unit only had one broadcasting station. By the end of 2017, Viettel Dak Nong has had more than 900 broadcasting stations, including 310 4G ones, having its coverage reach 100% of the province’s villages, townships, and residential areas with 420,000 mobile subscribers, accounting for 60% of the mobile service market share in Dak Nong province, 27,000 subscribers of high-speed internet optical cable. Its optical cable system also reaches 100% of the villages, hamlets and residential areas which have 30 households or more. Apart from that, Viettel Dak Nong is now servicing 17,000 digital television subscribers. Since the inauguration in April 2017, Viettel Dak Nong has had 74,000 4G service subscribers.
In 2017, the total revenue of Viettel Dak Nong reached VND 440 billion, increasing by 2.5% compared with 2016, contributing VND 27 billion to the locality’s budget and landing on the list of top 5 enterprises with highest contribution to the budget of Dak Nong. In addition, Viettel Dak Nong has also pushed its social security activities. In 2017, the unit partly financed the construction of two comradeship houses, granted 310 scholarships, worth VND 1 million each, to needy students keen on study, and joined congenital heart disease screenings for 2,700 children.
In the coming years, Viettel Dak Nong will introduce a number of new services, such as installation of security cameras, public Wi-Fi hotspots, online conference systems, traffic safety monitoring systems, to name a few, to meet the requirements of socio-economic development and defense and security maintenance in the Central Highlands.
Translated by Huu Duong