Cap on computer-borne SMSes waived off

MUMBAI: Telecom regulator Trai on Wednesday exempted text messages generated by or sent to technical systems and computers from the daily SMS cap it had put in place to stop pesky telemarketers. The 200 SMS per day cap is waived off only where the machine is not a mobile handset and when no manual intervention is needed to receive the text message. The move offers relief to business houses as they can now send out text messages to thousands of employees.

The regulator said the exemption would help a range of services, including providing details of drivers or taxis on booking of radio taxis and help companies communicate the tentative date of delivery of goods, tentative date of attending to complaints, the contact details of person attending to the complaint , etc, to their customers. The regulator had capped SMS originating from one mobile connection at 100 to curb unsolicited messaging, on September 27, 2011. It had since increased the limit to 200.

Justifying the exemption, the regulator said: “Trai has received representations that stakeholders are not able to send machine to machine and person to machine SMSes which are sent to initiate process or application for their operational requirements.”