In order to further strengthen consumer protection, the government has warned telecom services providers of fine up to Rs 10 lakh over failure to implement revised regulations dealing with unsolicited commercial Communication (UCC) and SMSes.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has introduced amendments to the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference Regulations (TCCCPR), 2018 that aim to deal with evolving methods of misuse of telecom resource and promote a more transparent commercial communication ecosystem for consumers.

“A financial disincentive (FD) of Rs 2 lakh for first instance of violation, Rs 5 lakh for second instance of violation and Rs 10 lakh per instance for subsequent instances of violation, shall be imposed on access providers in case of misreporting of the count of UCC,” said TRAI.

These FDs shall be imposed separately for registered and unregistered senders. Moreover, these FDs will be in addition to the FD imposed on access providers against invalid closure of complaints, and not fulfilling their obligations in respect of registration of Message Headers and Content Templates, said the telecom regulator.

The amendments aim that the legitimate commercial communication occur through registered entities, based on the preference and consent of the customers, thereby, balancing the interests of consumers with the need for supporting legitimate economic activities in the country, according to the Ministry of Telecommunications.

Consumers will now be able to make complaint against spam (UCC) calls and messages sent by unregistered senders without the need of first registering their preferences for blocking or receiving commercial communications.

“To make the complaint process simpler and more effective, it has been mandated that if a complaint made by a customer contains bare minimum essential data such as number of the complainant, number of Sender from which the Spam/UCC has been received, date on which spam is received and a brief about the UCC Voice Call/Message, the complaint shall be treated as a valid complaint,” according to revised norms.

Further, a customer can now make a complaint about spam/ UCC within 7 days of receiving spam as compared to earlier 3-day time limit.

“Time limit for taking action by the access providers against the UCC from unregistered senders has been reduced from 30 days to5 days. To ensure prompt action against the senders of UCC, the criterion for taking action against them has been revised and made more stringent,” said TRAI.

As compared to earlier criterion of ‘having 10 complaints against the sender in last 7 days’ to trigger action, it has been modified to “having 5 complaints against the sender in last 10 days’.

This would enable faster action and at the same time, covering more number of spammers, according to the regulator.

The revised regulations will enable TRAI in safeguarding consumer interests while promoting a more secure and trusted digital communication environment.