Over 850 million telephone users will soon get respite from unwanted calls and SMS from telemarketers.
After much delay, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India has notified that the new guidelines for telemarketers will come into effect from September 27.
Telephone consumers, both mobile and fixed, who register with the National Customer Preference Register (NCPR), which was earlier known as ‘Do Not Call Registry', would get relief from all commercial communications.
To register, consumers can either send an SMS or dial toll free number 1909. Mobile subscribers can register for the fully blocked category in which no commercial call or SMS will be allowed.
There is also the partially blocked category whereby one can opt to receive SMS on specific topics like healthcare, real estate, banking and automobiles. Under the partially blocked category, consumers will not receive any commercial calls but only SMS for which one has opted for.
Telemarketing companies that call or send SMS to consumers who have registered NCPR will have to pay fines ranging from Rs 25,000 to Rs 2.5 lakh. This is the second major attempt by the regulator to curb the menace of unwanted calls.
Under the earlier guidelines, 130 million subscribers had registered in the ‘do not call' registry. While this had brought down the telemarketing calls, unwanted SMS is still a major problem. To add more teeth to the new guidelines, the Department of Telecom has made it mandatory for all telemarketing companies to use number series starting with ‘140'.
This will help consumers to know that the call is from a telemarketer by just looking at the incoming phone number.