The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and the telecom operators have decided to meet every two weeks to sort the issues and concerns related to call drops. Further, a joint team comprising officials from TRAI and telecom companies would assess the results of the network quality tests. The tests would be conducted in Delhi, Mumbai, Bhubaneswar, Indore, Patna, Pune and Surat by December 2015.
Meanwhile, TRAI has stated that, as of now, there is no change in its recent mandate to compensate consumers for call drops. TRAI has 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.
The telecom operators, however, have opposed this move on the ground that the compensation mechanism could cost them between 7.4 per cent and 36.8 per cent of their revenue. Further, the operators have claimed that such a move will be ineffective in resolving the issue of call drops.