Afriwave Telecom has been given the nod to operate interconnect clearing house services in Ghana after it was selected from four other applicants as the most qualified firm to deliver on the license.

ICH is expected to provide a common, independent mechanism for monitoring, routing, billing and settlement of local and international interconnect traffic for all existing and future telecommunications operators in the country. 

The company has also engaged world-class partners and industry experts to help bolster its team of specialists to deliver on the license.

Presenting to the National Communications Authority and Parliamentary Select Committee on Communications at a media briefing and tour of the site housing the equipment, the CEO of Afriwave Telecom Philip Sowah assured the august bodies that the company was ready to deliver on its mandate once it received the go-ahead from the NCA to proceed.

“We have engaged world-class partners and industry experts to help bolster our team of specialists to deliver on the license which will be rolled out in two phases,” he said. 

He explained that the first phase, -- Phase 1A – has two objectives: to will provide enhanced services to monitor and validate government revenues in accordance with Act 786 (International incoming tariff) and Act 864 (Communications Service Tax) to help government realise its revenues. 

The second objective would be the provision of anti-fraud management and revenue assurance systems, Philip stated that one of the world-class partners we have engaged was SIGOS (formerly Meucci) which has the expertise in real time monitoring of SIM-box fraud. 

“We will step up the number of test calls from the current 120,000 to a minimum of 400,000 per month. This should help arrest the sim box menace which is costing both the government and the telecos millions of Ghana cedis” he added.

The role out of phase 1B which will be after 1A will provide other value added services like EIR (Equipment Identity Register) services for the blocking of stolen handsets, a common platform for independent international wholesale carriers to deliver calls and the capability of routing of local interconnect calls.

Afriwave Telecom is a wholly owned Ghanaian company that employs a wide range of technologies in its operations including GSM, GPRS, LTE, Wi-max and CDMA among others was licensed by the National Communications Authority (NCA) as an Interconnect Clearing House, the first of its kind in Ghana in February 2015.