TRAI defers telemarketing guidelines to April 1

The wait for mobile subscribers to get relief from telemarketing calls has got longer. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has extended the deadline for a third time for implementation of guidelines to curb telemarketing calls, to April 1.

The regulator had issued guidelines in December last year to curb the pesky calls, as the earlier system of a ‘Do Not Call’ Registry did not meet much success. But due to unpreparedness of services providers and some differences between the department of telecommunications (DoT) and Trai, the implementation has been repeatedly delayed.

According to sources, the regulator had called a meeting of all operators last week and decided to postpone the date for implementation of telemarketing guidelines to April 1.

In its guidelines, Trai had suggested a penalty up to Rs 2.5 lakh on erring telemarketing companies. Earlier, it was Rs 500-1,000. It had also put restrictions on SMSes to 100 per day.

However, citing issues related to technical and network upgrades, operators had told Trai they’d need four to six months for putting the system in place.The telecom regulator had asked all service providers to put in place a system to filter telemarketing calls.

DoT had allotted a new ‘140’ series for telemarketers, instead of one starting ‘70’ as recommended by Trai, which has also delayed the process. Some differences have emerged between DoT and Trai on the subject.

After the allotment of a new series, the service providers will have to make many technical changes, including configuration of networks and putting in place filters to stop unsolicited commercial calls. This had delayed the implementation from January 1 to January 31 and subsequently to March 1. There are about 750 million telephone subscribers across the country.