International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research Vol ume 2, Issue 10, October-2011 1

ISSN 2229-5518

IJ SER 2011
http://www.ijser.org

Drop Call Probability Factors in Cellular
Networks
Nathaniel S. Tarkaa, J oseph M. Mom, Cosmas I. Ani

Abstract Of the numerous performance metrics applied to cellular telephone systems, probably none is more important for customer
satisfaction than the system drop call rate. Customers are more sensitive to call dropping than to call blocking at initiation. Proper
system design and operation involve keeping the drop call rate as low as possible. Call/packet dropping refers to the event described
as the termination of calls in progress before either involved party intentionally ends the call. There are numerous drop call causes in
cellular networks with majority of them occurring in the Um interfaces mainly due to lack of radio resources created by electromagnetic
causes and user mobility (i.e. handover). Another important contributor of drop call rate is the traffic load in which, the call arrival rate
and holding time play significant roles. Drop call probability is defined as the probability that a call is terminated due to one or all of the
above-mentioned causes and is basically estimated from drop call rate by applying the Poisson probability distribution function. Drop-
call probability has been the subject of several network performance studies and a major contributor to service optimization in
established cellular networks. In this paper, we present an overview of drop-call probability factors in cellular networks. Moreover,
some of the factors have been analyzed to study the trends in relation to an operative GSM network and the results are discussed.

Index Terms drop call probability, holding time, packet dropping, quality of service (QoS), traffic load.

1 INTRODUCTION
rop-call probability is one of the key performance
indicators (KPI) used by various mobile phone
service operators for measuring quality of service
(QoS). It generally refers to the phenomenon of
call/ packet dropping in both voice and data networks.
Call/ packet dropping refers to the event described as the
termination of calls in progress before either involved
party intentionally ends the call.

Wireless networks involve radio and wire-line links as
well as switching hardware and software, and data base
operations. However, drop call rate is mainly determined
by the radio resources in the network. These resources
translate mainly into the plethora of radio channels all of
which share a common bandwidth through a process
known as frequency reuse.

Call dropping is caused by lack of available radio
channels which in turn may be caused by propagation
factors such as distance losses, path loss, multipath
fading, shadowing and RF interference [3], [4], [5], [6].
Other channel capacity varying factors include handover
and service prioritization [7], [11].
As the signal travels from the transmitting antenna to the
receiving antenna, it loses strength. This may be due to
the phenomenon of path loss, or it may be due to the
Rayleigh effect [4]. Rayleigh (or Rician) effect is due to the
fast variation of the signal level both in terms of
amplitude and phase between the transmitting and
receiving antennas when there is no line of sight.
Rayleigh fading can be divided into two kinds: multipath
fading and frequency-selective fading [4], [5], [6].
Shadowing is caused by diffraction which is a
phenomenon that takes place when a radio wave strikes a
surface and changes its direction of propagation owing to
the inability of the surface to absorb it [4]. The loss due to
diffraction depends upon the kind of obstruction in the
path which may be high buildings or hills. It is known as
shadowing because the mobile receiver is in the shadow
of these structures.
Handover or handoff is the mechanism that transfers an
ongoing call from one cell to another as a user moves
through the coverage area of a cellular system. If and
when a Mobile Terminal (MT) moves, it is quite possible
that the currently serving Base Station Subsystem (BSS)
may no longer be able to provide reasonable quality of
service as compared to some other BSS. Rather than
dropping the service to this MT, the currently serving
Mobile Switching Centre (MSC) may decide to hand over
this service to some other better serving BSS or in some
cases to another MSC. Occasionally, this handover
process fails and the call drops [8, 10]. The minimization
of drop call rate needs efficient schemes for making
handover requests at the right place at the right time
based on the propagation environment.
Drop-call probability is also influenced by traffic intensity
parameters such as call arrival rate and call duration [1], [
2]. Theoretically, drop-call probability is defined as traffic
lost/ traffic offered [12].
The rest of the paper is organized as follows: Section 2
D

Nathaniel S. Tarka is a lecturer with Dept of Electrical and Electronics
Engineering,University of Agriculture, Makurdi-Nigeria.
Joseph M. Mom is is a lecturer with Dept of Electrical and Electronics
Engineering,University of Agriculture, Makurdi-Nigeria
.+2348059121411. E-mail: josseffmom@yahoo.com
Cosmas I. Ani is a lecturer with Dept of Electronic Engineering,
University of Nigeria, Nsukka.
International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research Vol ume 2, Issue 10, October-2011 2
ISSN 2229-5518

IJ SER 2011
http://www.ijser.org

discusses the influence of radio resources availability and
utilization on drop-call probability. This is followed by a
discussion about the effects of traffic parameters in
section 3. Section 4 is about estimation of drop-call
probability. In section 5, some experimental results and
analysis with data obtained from an operating GSM
network are presented. Lastly in section 6 is the
conclusion.
2 RADIO RESOURCES
In many network environments, the available network
capacity varies unpredictably with time [11]. For
example, in a reservation-based network with multiple
priority levels, high priority calls such as video
conferences or emergency services may take precedence
over ordinary traffic. The network capacity available for
low priority traffic thus varies with time based on high
priority traffic demands. In wireless networks, capacity
variation arises from the mobility of users (e.g.,
handovers) and the time-varying characteristics of the
wireless propagation environment [7]. The patterns of
wireless interference for the active connections may
dynamically change the available capacity for these
connections [11]. Such networks are generally referred to
as stochastic capacity networks.
Cellular systems use one or more of four different
techniques of access (TDMA, FDMA, CDMA, and SDMA)
[11]. In TDMA/ FDMA cellular radio systems, Fixed
Channel Allocation (FCA) is used to allocate channels to
customers. In FCA, the number of channels in the cell
remains constant irrespective of the number of customers
in that cell. This, results in traffic congestion and some
calls being lost when traffic gets heavy [8], [11]. A better
way of channel allocation in cellular systems is Dynamic
Channel Allocation (DCA) which is supported by the
Digital Cellular System (DCS) and other systems. DCA is
a better way not only for handling bursty cell traffic but
also in efficiently utilizing the cellular radio resources.
DCA allows the number of channels in a cell to vary with
the traffic load, hence increasing channel capacity with
little costs [11]. Since a cell is allocated a group of
frequency carriers (e.g. f1-f7) for each user, this range of
frequencies is the bandwidth of that cell [11].
2.1 Number of Channels
The number of channels is calculated using the Erlang B
formula for loss probability (assuming Mobile Assisted
Handover (MAHO) Scheme) [9], [12]. The calculation is
done with Erlang B calculator.
The formula is given as follows:

B =
A
N
N!

A
k
k!
N
k=0
(1)

Where B =loss probability, A =offered traffic intensity in
Erlangs, N =available number of channels
This shows that drop-call probability decreases as the
number of channels increases.
2.2 Channel Utilization
The channel utilization depends on the total traffic,
t
and
is given by [12]:

p =
Traf ic Intensity
Number of channels
(2)
3 TRAFFIC PARAMETERS
In this section, the basic principles of some of the key
drop-call probability related traffic parameters will be
discussed. They are as follows:
3.1 Call Arrival Rate
Call arrival rate,
t
, refers to the traffic offered expressed
as the number of call attempts per unit time [12], which in
this case is given as:

t
=
Number of Call Attempts/ busy hour
14400 seconds/ busy hour
(3)

To relate call arrival rate to the performance of a network,
the term grade of service (GOS) denoted by B is used. The
GOS can be mean proportion of time for which
congestion exists, or probability of congestion or blocking
probability, or probability that a call will be dropped due
to congestion. It is defined in [12] as:

B =troic lost/ troic ocrcJ (4)

From (4), it is obvious that drop call-probability varies
inversely with call arrival rate, that is, drop-call
probability decreases as call arrival rate increases. This
leads to the deduction that system performance improves
as the traffic entering the system increases [1], [2].
3.2 Call Duration
Call duration is another parameter that can affect the
quality of service in a cellular network, hence it is
considered when planning the network [1], [2]. Call
duration or mean call holding time is defined as the time
a mobile station takes to complete a call connection.
Mathematically, call duration is given by [12]:

=
A

(5)
Where A =traffic intensity in Erlangs, =call arrival rate

Thus call arrival rate varies with call duration the same
way it varies with drop-call probability. Thus drop-call
probability increases with a decrease in call duration.
International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research Vol ume 2, Issue 10, October-2011 3
ISSN 2229-5518

IJ SER 2011
http://www.ijser.org

4 DROP-CALL PROBABILITY
Drop-call probability is given by [1]:

P( =n) =
(v
d
t)
n
n!
e
-v
d
t
, n 0 (6)

Here, v
d
is the drop-call rate, t

the call duration, while Y is
a random variable that counts the number of drops and n
is the confirmed calls dropped. This is a Poisson
Probability function with a discrete variable which counts
the number of dropped calls [1], [2], [13], [14].
The number of dropped calls is calculated from the
relation:

rop coll rotc =
No.of dropped calls
No.of call attempts
(7)

The probability of occurrence of the call dropping event
(drop-call probability) based on the above formula is thus
calculated using the Poisson mass probability function
from Microsoft Excel.
5 EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
In this section, the analysis of the above mentioned drop-
call probability factors with measured data obtained from
an operative GSM network are presented. The data were
collected over a period of four months for each of six
MSCs and comprised of the traffic intensity, drop-call
rate, and number of call attempts as shown in Table 1.
From these, the drop-call probability and the required
radio channel and traffic parameters were estimated. The
radio channel related parameters are: number of channels
and channel utilization factor, while the traffic parameters
are: call arrival rate and call duration. The mean values of
these parameters were estimated per cell for each of the
six MSCs.
The results indicate that on average, drop-call probability
decreases as the number of radio channels, utilization
factor, call arrival rate, and call duration increase, all in
line with the above stated basic principles. These trends
are depicted in Table 2 showing mean values of these
parameters and the drop-call probability. These are
further represented graphically in Fig. 1, 2, 3, 4.
The interpretation of these results is that the network in
question was well established and optimized and
operating optimally during the period the measurements
were taken. The kinks noticed in the curves are not
unexpected because of the constantly varying and
unpredictable propagation characteristics of the radio
channel.
6 CONCLUSION
In this paper, a wide variety of factors influencing drop-
call probability have been identified and firstly explained
on basic principles and axioms available in literature for
cellular radio networks. In this case, the available radio
resources and their utilization as well as traffic intensity
related parameters play significant roles. More work has
been carried out to discover the trends of these drop-call
probability factors in a live GSM network. Starting with
data obtained from the network, mean values were
computed for the number of channels, utilization factor,
and then the call arrival rate and call duration. At least,
the results show a general trend that is in line with the
basic principles. The result can be used as a good guide
for evaluating and optimizing an operating GSM
network. In this case, the results show the network under
study as a well established network. The result can
further be used for drop-call probability model
simulation for further confirmation.

TABLE 1
NETWORK DATA

MSC

Numb
er of
Active
Base
Statio
ns
Perio
d
Traffic
Intensi
ty

Dro
p-
call
Rate
in
busy
hour
(%)

Drop-
call rate
with
handov
er (%)

Numbe
r of
Call
Attemp
ts in
Busy
Hour
MSC
1
65 Mar
Apr
May
June
5211
5190
4933
5098
2.10
2.38
3.17
2.80
0.05
0.06
0.06
0.08
250014
251185
248991
249492
MSC
2
89 Mar
Apr
May
June
3988
4315
4591
3977
1.35
2.35
1.92
1.99
0.07
0.056
0.05
0.04
228825
220306
231222
201650
MSC
3
60 Mar
Apr
May
June
2611
2499
2598
2535
3.10
2.60
2.80
2.96
0.07
0.07
0.08
0.06
148700
149881
151596
157018
MSC
4
54 Mar
Apr
May
June
1836
2071
1920
1848
3.17
2.69
2.85
2.34
0.04
0.06
0.06
0.09
116561
129988
113818
134853
MSC
5
51 Mar
Apr
May
June
1718
1801
1698
1607
1.99
2.20
2.32
1.98
0.09
0.065
0.08
0.08
117876
115928
112131
113339
MSC
6
46 Mar
Apr
May
June
1391
1438
1298
1319
1.51
1.71
1.81
1.91
0.08
0.08
0.08
0.08
95213
94388
91889
90866





International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research Vol ume 2, Issue 10, October-2011 4
ISSN 2229-5518

IJ SER 2011
http://www.ijser.org



TABLE 2
MEAN VALUES OF COMPUTED TRAFFIC/CHANNEL PARAMETERS
AND DROP-CALL PROBABILITY




Fig. 1: Variation of Drop-call Probability with Number of
Channels

Fig. 2: Variation of Drop-call Probability with
channel utilization
Channel Utilization

Fig. 3: Variation of Drop-call Probability with Call-Arrival
Rate

30 40 50 60 70 80 90
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
4.5
5
5.5
6
6.5
D
r
o
p
-
c
a
l
l

P
r
o
b
a
b
i
l
i
t
y
(
%
)
Number of Channels
0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
4.5
5
5.5
6
6.5
Channel Utilization
C
a
l
l

D
r
o
p

P
r
o
b
a
b
i
l
i
t
y

(
%
)
MSC Call
Arrival
Rate
(calls/ s)
Call
Duration
(s)
Number
of
Channels
Channel
Utilization
Factor
Drop-call
Probabilit
y (%)
MSC1 0.27 291 82 0.96 1.7
MSC2 0.18 269 53 0.90 3.5
MSC3 0.18 245 47 0.92 3.9
MSC4 0.16 223 41 0.88 4.5
MSC5 0.16 216 37 0.91 5.3
MSC6 0.14 211 34 0.88 6.1

0.16 0.18 0.2 0.22 0.24 0.26 0.28
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
4.5
5
5.5
6
6.5
Call Arrival Rate (calls/s)
D
r
o
p

C
a
l
l

P
r
o
b
a
b
i
l
i
t
y

(
%
)
International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research Vol ume 2, Issue 10, October-2011 5
ISSN 2229-5518

IJ SER 2011
http://www.ijser.org


Figure 4: Variation of Drop-call Probability with Call
Duration

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210 220 230 240 250 260 270 280 290 300
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
4.5
5
5.5
6
6.5
Call Duration (secs.)
D
r
o
p
-
c
a
l
l

P
r
o
b
a
b
i
l
i
t
y

(
%
)