Compensation for drops should be voluntary: Telenor

NEW DELHI: Telenor India, the only telecom company in the country that has been compensating users for call drops, has said such measures should be voluntary and not mandated by the regulator. “I think it should be more from the operator side. They should decide. Definitely operators have to reduce the drops, but at the same time it should be more voluntary or proactive initiatives from the operator side,” Tanveer Mohammad, Telenor India’s Chief Operating Officer, told ET. Telenor India has been offering extra talk time to users to make up for call drops over the past two years.

When a call drops, the company notifies the caller by SMS of an additional minute of talk time added to his or her account.

The extra minute is valid for 24 hours. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India and Indian carriers have locked horns over compensation for call drops in a country with almost 1 billion mobile phone subscribers. While the regulator directed that subscribers should be compensated starting January 1, the telecom carriers said that they will wait for a court order on the matter. “Customers are the deciders and in India, we have all the provisions, including MNP (mobile number portability) and national M NP," Mohammad said.