Telecom operators have sought a review of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India’s (TRAI) proposal to implement compensation mechanism for call drops. Industry bodies, Association of Unified Telecom Service Providers of India and Cellular Operators Association of India have written a joint letter to TRAI claiming that annual industry compensation due to dropped calls will range from Rs 100 billion in case 10 per cent of consumers claim compensation to Rs 540 billion if 50 per cent of consumers claim it. Operators are of the view that such a huge outflow of money from the operators’ accounts will force them to either shut network operations or hike the tariff, which will negatively impact both the consumers and the operators.

TRAI has recently issued the ninth amendment to the Telecom Consumers Protection Regulations, 2012 mandating operators to provide compensation to consumers for call drops, with effect from January 1, 2016. Under the compensation mechanism, service providers would have to credit Re 1 in the account of the calling consumer for every dropped call. However, such credit will be limited to three dropped calls in a day. Operators claim that such a move will be ineffective in resolving the issue of call drops.