NTC Orders Performance Evaluation Of Teletech

The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) has ordered its regional offices to conduct an assessment of the performance of Telecommunications Technologies Philippines Inc. (TeleTech) to check its compliance with the government telephone roll-out program.

TeleTech is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Eastern Telecommunications Phils Inc. (ETPI) tasked with installing and operating the company's landlines.

Although the NTC has extended the provisional authority of TeleTech to finish laying down its 300,000 phone lines obligation, it is still covered by the three-year rollout schedule provided under EO 109.

TeleTech was supposed to complete the program in September last year, but so far it has only put up about 80,000 landlines in its Metro Manila and Cagayan Valley region assigned service areas.

NTC common carriers division chief Edgardo Cabarios, however, pointed out that they could not wait for TeleTech to wrap up its work before doing the assessment.

According to him, five months have already passed since TeleTech's deadline and it is now NTC's duty to determine whether or not the company has complied with the program by verifying the number of lines installed in the region.

Once proven that TeleTech failed to meet its obligation on time, the company is likely to face monetary and administrative penalties.

The NTC, though, is yet to release the guidelines governing non-compliance even as the regulatory body gave assurance that it will not impose the maximum penalty of cancellation of licenses since the carriers already have existing subscribers who would be adversely affected by such a drastic action.

The delay in the rollout was primarily blamed on lack of interconnection with dominant carrier Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) which discouraged potential customers from subscribing to TeleTech's line.

The link-up issue, which dragged on for more than two years, was only settled after a new management took over PLDT.

Aside from the interconnection problem, ETPI was also hit by a financial crisis as it experienced difficulties in obtaining loans for the project.