COAI seeks review of 100 SMSes per day norm

The Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) has asked the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) to reconsider its recommendation to limit 100 SMSes per day per SIM, saying the such a regulation may pose a potential challenge to the "fundamental rights" of an ordinary subscriber.

To stop the menace of pesky SMSes, the Trai had asked telecom operators to limit the number of short message services from September 27.

There are several instances where SMSes are an important mode of communication. There could be a situation where a customer has exhausted the limit and suddenly some emergency occurs. Due to this artificial restriction, safety of the subscriber may be jeopardised, COAI Director General Rajan S Mathews said in a letter to the telecom regulator.

Trai had said that no access provider shall permit sending of more than one hundred SMSes per day per SIM.

While in the case of post-paid, it had restricted the number of SMSes to 3,000 per month per SIM.

In case a customer wants to use more than the prescribed limit of 100 SMSes a day, the access provider shall obtain an undertaking from such subscribers that the said telephone number shall not be used for sending any commercial communications.

Further, regarding allocating separate series '140' for the telemarketing through the fixed line services, the letter added that the new number will pose challenge to service providers.

The identification of the calling party will be difficult and the service providers will not be able to reconcile their IUC invoices. This will lead to inter-operator IUC disputes as BSNL may claim highest carriage charges of 65 paise as terminating charge, he added.