MTN SME Data Share plan: I did not use 1 GB data plan in 2 hrs

I recently received a complaint from one of my MTN SME Data share beneficiaries that he didn't know what happened to the data I sent since his data is already used up.

The thing is that I now normally buy up to 10GB from MTN for N10,000 and since I probably use less than that in 30 days, I normally just resell it out to my friends and family at the rate of N1 per 1MB and not for profit. So, I sold 1GB to this friend for N1000 as I usually do and it really saved him money unlike if he were to browse on a Pay as you go rate for 5 kobo per KB.

Well, I checked his data and he only had 6MB remaining even though I sent him 1GB about 2 hrs earlier and there was an SMS confirmation also sent to him by MTN from 131. The first thing I asked him was why he didn't complain to me earlier rather than later since 1 GB can easily be used up within 1 hr depending on the efficiency of MTN's internet service. Mathematically, 1GB can be used up in 500 seconds at the rate of 2MB/s and that's quite possible under a 3G connection. The biggest culprit I suspected in this case that could use up to 1 GB in less than 2hrs was Video files. He might have download 2 hr length videos from YouTube using an Android app running in the background.

From my experience, I know that apps like 2GO, Whatsapp, Facebook, Twitter or even Yahoo mail doesn't use up data that much in 2 hrs but downloading a 2 hr movie from YouTube could do it and the first thing I wanted to know was what he downloaded.

Anyway, while this would probably amount to a waste of my time but in order to justify my actions and prove him wrong, I decided to do some investigation by probing his memory card. Funny enough, the guy had a 16 GB memory card plugged into his phone and that was where I suspected he might have downloaded files to.

I wasn't getting results connecting his phone to my computer using USB mode and so I just decided to read his memory card by using an SD card reader on my laptop. After I connected the memory card directly, I was was able to see all his files and folders and using Windows sorting ability, I decided to sort files in order of their download dates. One cool thing I love about mobile phones and computers is that they normally record their creation dates and so it was quite easy for me to know when his downloaded video files were downloaded by simply looking at the creation dates through my computer.

I soon noticed that there was a folder named Snaptube and it was a folder created by a YouTube downloading app he installed and that was where I found files he created for the same day in question and when I checked out just 2 of such files, I noticed that there were already over 600 MB in size. So, Snaptube was the culprit and it was running in the background. So, with Snaptube and a good internet connection, you can probably use up to 1 GB in just 1 hr. I noticed that he liked downloading dinosaur and animal videos from YouTube.

He didn't tell me initially that he downloads videos in the background using Snaptube and I didn't notice it either until I checked the memory card and also launched the app. Some file were in progress and some were already fully downloaded on that same day he claimed that he has not received the 1 GB.

After I showed him the proof he was just speechless and probably didn't know how much data he could use up in less than 1 hr under a 3G data connection speed.

One wish I however have with MTN's SME DATA share plan is that they should give sponsors more access to information regarding data usage of their beneficiaries as well as themselves. If it was easy for sponsors to check how much data they've sent to their beneficiaries and how much they've used up too, many issues relating to this plan would be settled without calling MTN customer service. I actually tried calling MTN customer service first to inqure but after noticing I was the 14th person in the queue, I just dropped my call.