The Cell Phone Culture

As a rather “late bloomer” in terms of cell phone use in the U.S., the extensive cell phone culture in Zambia was a bit of a shock to me. It’s been an interesting learning experience, but I think I have now learned enough to share what I know.

Zambia, I believe like many developing countries, does not have a significant telephone line network. In fact, the entire country’s phone directory is a single volume less than 2 centimeters thick. That includes white and yellow pages! This phone system also isn’t as sophisticated as the ones I am used to. A large company, instead of having a single phone line and a switch board, will have a series of phone numbers that a customer calls until they find a line that isn’t busy.

Due to the slow development of the telephone infrastructure, many Zambians just jumped over the land-line phase of communications development and went straight to cell phone technology. Cell phones are quite popular in Lusaka and all other large towns in the country. I know very few people that don’t own at least one cell phone. It’s a very competitive business with two large and one smaller provider, all advertising heavily. When arriving in the Lusaka airport, you are immediately confronted with multiple posters advertising the two larges companies. On one local radio station, the news program is sponsored by one cell phone company, and the traffic program that follows is sponsored by another. The same announcer goes from praising the virtues of the one provider directly into suggesting people switch over to the other provider. He probably, like many Zambians actually has two phones, one for each provider. It is significantly cheaper to call people who are on the same phone network that you are, so heavy callers often have two phones. One friend of mine only has one phone, but he has two SIM cards (the “brains” of a cell phone) and he switches the cards depending on who he is going to call.

Instead of having a monthly service contract, most Zambians instead have pay-as-you-go phones, with no contract. Talk-time can be purchased in various quantities starting from as low as about $1 (which would only last you for a few short phone calls). To add talk-time to your phone you buy a top-up card and scratch off the protective coating to reveal the number you punch in to add the talk-time to your phone. These top-up cards are available in cell phone company stores, but more commonly are purchased in little shops and stalls on the side of the road. For those who don’t have a cell phone, these stalls also usually include pay phones. There are no coins in Zambia, so this will just be a regular looking phone that you pay the proprietor of the stall to use. You can also buy talk time from guys actually selling it in the middle of the road, walking up and down between the cars (along with the people selling newspapers, fruit, cell phones, puppies…) while waiting for the light to change.

There also is some etiquette that has developed around cell phone use. If someone rings you and then hangs up before you answer, it is because they are almost out of talk time and want you to call them. Because talk time is relatively expensive, people tend to make short calls, moving quickly from “hello” to the business at hand. In addition, many businesses will have a company cell phone as well as a land line because it is much cheaper for someone using a cell phone to call another cell phone than to call a land line. You can also send text messages (called SMS messages), which are relatively cheap if sent to someone with the same cell provider. However, you can’t reply to a SMS if you are out of talk time, whereas you can receive a phone call if you are out of talk time, so for urgent matters a direct phone call is best.

Sadly, as the cell phone market has become more crowded, companies have not lowered their prices. Instead they have tried to use various promotions to gain and retain customers. Currently one cell phone company is having a promotion in which the grand prize is a new home. The more talk time you buy the more chances you have to win!