Mobile operators have opposed the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India’s (TRAI) recommendation that users be compensated for call drops.
Industry body Cellular Operators’ Association of India (COAI) said that consumer compensation will not resolve the problem of the call drops. They were responding to TRAI’s consultation paper on the issue.
The paper says that “users should not be charged for calls that get dropped within five seconds.”
It had sought stakeholders’ comments on how a mobile user should be compensated for call drops either through credit of talk-time in minutes/seconds or credit of talk-time in monetary terms or any other method. It has asked for comments till September 28 from all stakeholders.
However, COAI has asked TRAI not to make compensation to customers for ‘call drops’ a mandatory requirement for operators.
Internationally, with the exception of Columbia, no country mandates compensation to consumers for dropped calls, said the COAI letter. “There are some instances where some operators in certain geographies are following such measures, but not all operators in those geographies are compensating for call drops,” it added.
These operators largely adopt such measures according to their own business model and there are several “technical and reconciliation issues such as identification of the responsible telecom service provider (TSP) for the call drop”, it said.
Other factors Issues pertaining to handset quality and interference due to illegal wideband repeaters are also resulting in call drops, the COAI letter said.
The operators have asked for uniform enforcement of the mobile tower policy and guidelines, quick spectrum harmonisation, an increase in the quantum of spectrum in the 1800/ 2100/ 2300 MHz bands, tower space on government buildings and defence land, and faster right-of-way approval.
They have also sought the government and TRAI’s intervention in separate letters, saying support is required by the industry from various government departments to tackle the issue.
“…it is necessary that this issue should be discussed in its entirety, starting from what constitutes a call drop, why it happens, can it be eliminated in entirety, what steps can be taken to reduce it and can tariff intervention help to address the situation,” Bharti Airtel said in a response to TRAI.
Similarly, Reliance Communications also wrote to the regulator saying: “Compensation to the customers, in lieu of dropped calls, has the potential to increase disputes amongst the TSP and consumer and between TSPs. Hence, it is not a viable option and should not be considered.”
State-run BSNL also wrote to TRAI saying the majority of its customers are on a per-second plan so as such there is no financial loss in billing customers in the event of call drops. Bharti Airtel has also put all its pre-paid customers on per-second billing.
“Any such move by TRAI (on call drops) would require a detailed technical examination and thus may require extra capex/ opex investment by TSPs for such (compensation) implementation,” BSNL said in its letter.