Anisul Islam Noor :
Country’s mobile phone operators are offering different types of unwanted packages without the permission of the telephone regulator and thus cheating with the customers, it was alleged.
Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) also received such complaints about different packages, conditions and unwanted offers against different mobile phone operators, sources said.
But in most cases, the telecom regulator has not punished the offending operators.
In last year, the telephone watchdog had decided to monitor the unwanted packages offered by the operators. But the operators are still offering these packages to their customers as what they said that they had not been given any directive in this regard.
The BTRC’s systems and services division, which gives permission to the operators for packages, tariffs and service messages, is not working properly, complained the suffering phone users.
Abu Maher Ahnaf, young businessmen in the city’s at Palton area, said he got SMS from GarmeenPhone saying that ‘your voice chat service renewed at Tk 6.09 a week. To cancel dial 2828 and press*9’.
Ahnaf did not know when his offer has become active and he tried to cancel it so many times, but it did not work. As a result, Tk 6.09 is being deducted each week though he failed to chat with anyone as per the offer.
Jesmin Ahmed, a young designer in the capital’s Rampura Bonasri, recently received a short message on her mobile phone which reads: “If you want to enjoy a hot video of a Bollywood couple, press 1.”
She pressed the digit but nothing appeared on his mobile screen. Rather, she found that Tk 27 was deducted from her phone’s balance.
Jesmin is not the only one who was conned by these types of offers. Here comes the Directorate of National Consumer Rights Protection (DNCRP) as a saviour. A few aggrieved customers have already lodged complaints with the directorate, which has fined three operators after hearing from both the complainants and the accused.
Robi was fined Tk 4.27 lakh for five deceitful offers, while Grameenphone and Banglalink were fined Tk 2.50 lakh and Tk 25,000 respectively for one offer each.
After the fines were slapped, significant progress had taken place in bringing down the number of unwanted packages offered by the operators, according to industry insiders.
A top executive of a leading mobile phone operator said some third parties were involved in the fraudulent activities such as the hot video-sharing.
“We have severed ties with them when we noticed that this type of fraudulent offers,” said the official requesting anonymity.
Under these circumstances, the telecom division recently sent a letter to the telecom watchdog seeking information on whether the customers were falling into the operators’ trap because of these offers and how the regulator is handling the matter.
The letter, signed by Mazeda Yasmin, a deputy secretary of the division, asked the regulator to submit a report by this month.
If an operator does not take permission beforehand from the systems and services division, it could be fined, or in the worst case scenario it could see their licence cancelled, according to the Directive on Service and Tariff 2015.
Ghulam Rahman, president of the Consumers Association of Bangladesh, said they have also observed that the mobile operators are involved in fraudulent offers.
“But we can’t carry out any study on it, as our capacity is limited. We have received lots of complaints about such offers,” said Rahman, also a former chairman of the Anti-Corruption Commission.
He also requested the regulator to take initiative to ensure that the offers are simple and to reduce the number of packages.
There are 13.5 crore active mobile connections in Bangladesh. Of them, 7.19 crore have access to internet as of May this year, according to the BTRC.
