Trai recommends changes in MNP rules to curb portability request rejection

Rejection may be due to wrong submission or incorrect entry of UPC content by potential subscriber

To curb rejection of mobile number portability requests, telecom regulator Trai on Wednesday proposed to enhance roll of MNP clearing house which will have all the details of subscribers required for completion of the process.

A unique porting code (UPC) is issued to mobile subscriber when he places request for MNP to transfer his connection on some other network but the recipient operator (RO), on whose network the subscriber wants to move, does not get to know bill outstanding, validity of UPC etc that are crucial for completing the process.

The regulator said as per analysis of MNP report from April, 2016 to March, 2017 indicates that average rejection of porting requests by telecom operators in all the categories was about 11.16 per cent and rejections on the grounds of 'UPC Mismatch' and 'UPC expired' constituted about 40 per cent of the total rejections.

The rejection may be due to wrong submission or incorrect entry of the UPC content by the potential subscriber at the point of sale (PoS) of RO.

"Presently, there is no mechanism available with the RO to verify the content and status of expiry date of UPC. Therefore, it is proposed that a process may be added to the existing MNP process wherein content of UPC and date of validity of UPC along with the mobile number are shared by donor operator with respective MNP Clearing House (MCH)," the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) said in the draft paper.

The recipient operator can then send verification request with the mobile number and UPC to the MCH who in turn shall respond back instantly to RO conveying acceptance or rejection of the porting request on the basis of the content and date of validity of the UPC, generated for the particular mobile number, the draft said.

In case of outstanding due, the donor operator can trigger disconnection request of subscribers connection and at present the recipient operator or MCH has no mechanism to know about outstanding dues, bill date and notice served to the customer.

"The Authority is of the opinion that in the revised process, the DO shall communicate the above (bill related) details to RO via MCH. The MCH shall retain a copy of such information and timestamp them in its database for future reference. The entire process is expected to be fruitful in ensuring the appropriate timely action on the part of RO," Trai said.

Trai has invited public comments on the proposed MNP draft paper by August 31, 2017.