Complaints against Telecom Operators

Complaints against Telecom Operators- Shri Milind Deora, the Minister of State for Communications and Information Technology today informed Lok Sabha in written reply to a question that complaints have been received against some of the telecom operators including Reliance for overcharging and preventing the customers from porting.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has received complaints from some customers regarding wrong rejection of porting requests by telecom operators. They also came to know through media regarding Rs.10/- being charged for a message (SMS) for requesting porting code through Number ‘1900’.

(i) TRAI has issued direction dated 3rd December 2010 to all Cellular Mobile Telephone Service Providers and Unified Access Service Providers prohibiting extra charges for SMS sent to Short code ‘1900’.

(ii) In order to reduce the porting rejections by the service providers, TRAI issued direction to the telecom service providers on 24th May 2011 specifying that rejection under contractual obligation can be done on the following grounds:

• The post paid connection with bundled handset with contractual obligation having exit clause and the subscriber has not complied with the same; and

• Corporate connection with contractual obligation having an exit clause and the subscriber has not complied with the same.

Regarding outstanding payment it is specified that if the outstanding payment due from the subscriber, in the previous paid bill, is less than rupees ten, then the service provider may include the same in the subsequent bill of the subscriber without any penal charges.

(iii) TRAI has initiated action by issuing Show Cause Notices to service providers (M/S Bharti Airtel, M/S Idea, M/S Loop, M/s Reliance and M/S Vodafone) for violation of Mobile Number Portability (MNP) Regulations 2009 and the same will follow due process.