Why Lasco Financial Services Ltd stopped selling Unlocked Huawei smartphones as Caricel 5G beckons Blu Sky smartphones

Folks, sad news today!!! No, not the fact that Donald Trump is the new President-elect of the United States of America as is evident in the media!

Rather, it's the fact that Lasco Financial Services Ltd will no longer be selling unlocked Huawei smartphones as noted in the article “Lasco Financial exits mobile phone business”, published Wednesday, November 09, 2016 by Karena Bennett, The Jamaica Observer.

 

After one year of selling unlocked Huawei smartphones as reported in my blog article entitled “Huawei and Lasco to sell Unlocked dual-SIM smartphones - Why Number Portability means Open Market for unlocked smartphone”, Lasco Financial Services Ltd has decided to toss in the towel.

This comes as a surprise as Huawei is clearly ramping up with new products such as the Huawei Mate 9 and Huawei Porsche smartphones that were launched in November 2016 as detailed in my Geezam blog article entitled “Huawei Mate 9 and Porsche Design launches as Icon and Tech Leader meet”. 

Managing Director of Lasco Financial Services Ltd Jacinth Hall Tracey told the Jamaica Observer in an emailed response on Tuesday November 8^th 2016, quote: “The objective of entering the phone distribution business was not being achieved as envisioned, as the turnover of phone sales was slow. We subsequently decided to redeploy our resources and our focus to the growth and development of the existing business lines”.

Apparently Number Portability and the desire to have unlocked smartphones wasn't enough to entice Jamaicans to buy unlocked smartphones locally, as only 60,000 persons had made the switch as noted in the article “60,000 Switch Using Number Portability – Wheatley”, published Friday October 28, 2016, The Jamaica Gleaner.

But were other factors at play!?

Lasco Financial Services Ltd stops selling Huawei smartphones - Digicel and FLOW Jamaica had better sales and marketing 

Lasco Financial Services Ltd just couldn't compete with Digicel and FLOW Jamaica, as they had a much more active marketing and better organized distribution system and to sell their overpriced smartphones as note in my Geezam blog article entitled “FLOW Jamaica Stores Listed for Easy Location”.

 

Despite the growing trend toward Mobile money in the form of NCB Quisk and CONEC Mobile as described in my blog article entitled “How Quisk and AIS Mobile Money 2.0 heralds Cashless Society in Jamaica in July 2016” the trend did not propel more people to buy unlocked smartphones.

Most smartphones from Digicel and FLOW Jamaica aren't dual-SIM.

Dual-SIM smartphones are now all the rage with Jamaicans, especially the Sky and Blu such as the Blu Studio Energy 2 and Blu Energy X as described in my MICO Wars blog article entitled “How US$179 Blu Studio Energy 2 and US$109 Blu Energy X is bringing Dual-SIM Energy”.

Lasco Financial Services Ltd and Unlocked Huawei smartphones - Growing Strong as Caricel 5G beckons Blu Sky smartphones  

Still, Lasco Financial Services Ltd hasn't fared too badly in 2016 when compared to 2015:

1.      124 locations, up from 98 locations in August 2015

2.      7 loans locations up from 1 islandwide

3.      Doubling of employees islandwide

4.      JA$361 million to JA$1.4 billion increase in assets

They'll also be launching stores in Kingston and Montego Bay, with the Kingston store being a relocation of their original store. They may also be planning a push into Mobile money in partnership with Quisk as noted in my blog article entitled “Why VMBS joining AIS and Quisk Mobile Money 2.0 Platform as Avengers Assemble”. 

So as far as Managing Director Jacinth Hall Tracey is concerned, its expansion as usual for Lasco, quote: “This investment was necessary to build capacity in the core business to allow us to continue to achieve our growth objectives. Our staff complement has doubled and now stands at 80 very keen and able professionals who are also integral to our growth objectives. We also continue to engage our customers and support our agents through local, below the line marketing activity and continue to mark our presence in the US diaspora. New for this year is our support of our MoneyGram counterpart in The Bahamas, where we participated in the Jamaican Independence activities in that country”

Plus, they could always re-enter, selling dual-SIM smartphones, especially the Blu and Sky brands at cut-rate prices. something tell me that Lasco Financial Services Ltd will be returning to this business pretty soon, as the potential for growth due to the lack of high quality dual-SIM smartphones and feature phones is still significant!

So until a third Telecom Provider comes in for the form of Caricel to boost Number portability as predicted in my blog article entitled “How Number Portability has stalled in Jamaica but Caricel and 5G on the Horizon by 2020” the sale of unlocked mobile phones will remain a affair of the Christmas Barrel!

How to enable Calling Features and Codes on your Homephone Landline in Jamaica

Of late, Landline, also called POTS (Plain Old Telephone System) has slowly been making a comeback.

The nostalgia of having a phone at home was captured in the Homefone (spelt “Home Phone” officially!) , which began to skyrocket in popularity after they had dropped the calling rate for landline to mobile rate to $3.09 per minute, billed per second as noted in the article “LIME cuts landline to mobile rate”, published Thursday, July 04, 2013, The Jamaica Observer.

 

This was around the same time that LIME, the former incarnation of FLOW, has dropped their JA$2.99 Talkez plan as noted in my blog article entitled “LIME drops JA$2.99 Talk EZ to All Networks as Digicel promises something Bigger”, marking a revival for the struggling telecom provider.

There are now three (3) Home Phone plans:

1.      Home Phone Basic

2.      Home Phone Essential

3.      Home Phone Plus

The details for them are as listed below:

Package	Monthly Price	Details
Home Phone Basic	$1,200	Includes 100 free minutes of talk time per month to call any local landline. Includes FREE Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, 3-Way Calling, Automatic Busy Redial, Caller Id, Priority Ring, Selective Call Rejection
Home Phone Essential	$1,500	500 free minutes of talk time per month to call any local landline number. Includes FREE Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, 3-Way Calling, Automatic Busy Redial, Caller Id, Priority Ring, Selective Call Rejection
Home Phone Plus	$1,800	1000 free minutes to call any local mobile and landline numbers. Includes FREE Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, 3-Way Calling, Automatic Busy Redial, Caller Id, Priority Ring, Selective Call Rejection

As for the Calling rates, that has improved dramatically, dropping as low as JA$0.99 per minute on per second billing. 

Destination	Rate per minute (excludes GCT)
Local Rates
FLOW Home Phone (formerly Columbus Communications' Flow)	$0.99
FLOW Home Phone (formerly LIME)	$0.99
FLOW Home Phone (NEW)	$0.99
Digicel Fixed Line	$2.40
Other Local Operators (OLO) Fixed Line	$2.40
FLOW (formerly LIME) Mobile	$2.85
Digicel Mobile	$2.85
Other Local Operators (OLO) Mobile	$2.85
International Rates
USA, Canada and UK (landline)	$10.00
Caribbean	$25/$35

They've now recovered with their mobile service having grown to 1 million customers to the point of their entire Network, Mobile, Fixed line and Broadband Network, going down between Friday September 2nd and Saturday September 3rd 2016 as noted in my Geezam blog article entitled “FLOW Jamaica Network Outage due to 1 Million Satisfied Customers”.

This is a strong sign they are getting a lot of customer who are seeking to save money on their mobile and landline calling, as Digicel still isn't price competitive despite offering more advance products such as Digicel LTE and Digicel Play as noted in my Geezam blog article entitled “How to Activate a Digicel LTE Smart Plan on your Smartphone”.

So it’s worth your while to re-learn the various tricks that your landline that puts your POTS on par with a modern Google Android phone as listed below.

Voicemail	If you miss a call, callers can choose to leave a voice message.
Check voicemail	Retrieve your voice messages.	Dial *91
Call Waiting	If someone calls while you're on the phone, you can put the first call on hold while you take the second.
Create a distinct alert	Use a distinct sound to notify you of calls from a specific number.	Dial *32
Delete a distinct alert	Delete a distinct sound to notify you of calls from a specific number.	Dial *33
Cancel Call waiting	Cancel your Call Waiting if you want an uninterrupted call.	Dial *70
Automatic Calling Features	Dial a short code instead of dialling a full number.
Recall	Redial the number of the last incoming call.	Dial *69
Callback	Redial the number of the last outgoing call.	Dial *66
Wakeup Call Feature	Turn your phone into an alarm clock by programming it to ring at a certain time.
Activate Wakeup Call	Turn on the Wakeup Call feature.
Cancel Wakeup Call	Turn off the Wakeup Call feature.	Dial *100
Check Wakeup Call Status	Check to see if your Wakeup Call is activated or not.	Dial *101
Call Forwarding	Have your calls forwarded to another mobile, landline or Flow phone.
Enable Call Forwarding	Turn on the Call Forwarding feature.	Dial*72
Disable Call Forwarding	Turn off the Call Forwarding feature.	Dial*73
Enable busy line Call Forwarding	Turn on the Call Forwarding feature for when your line is busy.	Dial*90
Change busy line Call Forwarding	Change the number your calls get forwarded number to when your line is busy.	Dial*40
Enable no-answer Call Forwarding	Turn on the Call Forwarding feature for when calls to your line go unanswered.	Dial*92
Change no-answer Call Forwarding	Change the number your calls get forwarded number to when calls to your line go unanswered.	Dial*41
Disable no-answer Call Forwarding	Turn off the Call Forwarding feature for when calls to your line go unanswered.	Dial*93
Enable specific number	Call Turn on the Call Forwarding feature from a Forwarding specific number to another mobile, landline or Flow phone.	Dial*36
Disable specific number	Call Turn off the Call Forwarding feature from a specific Forwarding number to another mobile, landline or Flow phone.	Dial*37

I’ll be doing more articles on Landline on my blog. Sharing is caring so share them with as many people as you can.

Here’s the link:

Home Phone Plans

FLOW Store in Jamaica

FLOW Jamaica Website

FLOW Jamaica Twitter Feed: @FLOWJamaica

FLOW Jamaica Facebook Page

FLOW Jamaica YouTube Channel

How to find work in Jamaica at Call Centers - IBEX and clients Amazon, AT&T expanding to Montego Bay, Mandeville and May Pen

“We expect to be at full capacity by just after March. Right now, we are already looking for strategic areas not just in Portmore, but in Kingston”

IBEX CEO Robert 'Bob' Dechant on their Expansion plans into Montego Bay, Mandeville and May Pen

Call Center peeps at Advantage, Xerox, IBEX and Fullgram, I've got news that's more interesting than this hairless cat.

IBEX, which hails from Washington, DC in the USA is coming to Montego Bay, Mandeville and May Pen as reported in the article “BPO Company IBEX Plans Rollout To Three More Parishes”, published Sunday October 30, 2016 by Tameka Gordon, The Jamaica Gleaner. 

IBEX, who are based in Portmore Pines in Portmore, currently has some 500+ Customer Service Agents and other staff. They’re already in the process of recruiting some 400 Customer Service Agents as pointed out my blog article entitled “How to find work in Jamaica at Call Centers - IBEX Global paying 400 Call Center Agents JA$400 per hour”.

They'll likely double their call centre operations to between 1,200 to 1,600 staff members by March 2017 for their main clients Amazon and AT&T, even as they seek to expand elsewhere as noted in the article “ Ibex Global considers Mandeville, Montego Bay for expansion”, published Sunday, October 30, 2016 by Avia Collinder, The Jamaica Observer.

At that rate, they'll easily hit US$20 million annually, delivering some US$10 million in business in the year ending July 2017!

For now, they eyeing expanding into the abandoned supermarket behind their 45,600 square feet of leased space on the Portmore Pines Plaza to facilitate their current expansion plans to quote Site Director and Country Manager Dalgleish Joseph, quote: “We can take over, completely renovate, and set up about 600 more works stations there, which can mean just about 1,200 more employees working in that building, in conjunction with what we have now. Right now, we have four shifts, with operations starting from 7 a.m. to midnight but soon we will be moving to 24 hours. When that happens, the shift system will increase”.

So why does this have me excited?

IBEX coming to Montego Bay, Mandeville and May Pen - JA$400 per hour Work in Clarendon

For one, it means employment for people in the Country parts of Jamaica. No more having to travel to Kingston to work in a Call Center in the New Kingston area, as you could easily find work in your parish.

Were they to expand into Montego Bay, Mandeville and May Pen, their numbers could potentially swell to 5000. This would make IBEX one of the largest Call Centers in Jamaica next to Sutherland Global, who are already on the prowl for some 1,500 employees as noted in my blog article entitled “How to find work in Jamaica at Call Centers - 1500 Call Center Agents needed by Sutherland Global”. 

This has me interested, as if I could get a job with IBEX sometime after March 2017, not only would I be getting at least $400 per hour, but I could potentially return back home to Clarendon.

Suddenly, working in a Call Center, as is my current situation as pointed out in my blog article entitled “How to find work in Jamaica at Call Centers - A Brief Listing of Call Center Job Openings in New Kingston”, doesn't seem like such a bad idea!!!

Here's the link:

http://www.ibexglobal.com/careers