Prolonged shelf life of prepaid loads sought

MANILA, Philippines – The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) has ordered cellular telephone service providers to lengthen the shelf life of prepaid loads.

The order came on the heels of a Senate probe on complaints of poor service and unfair market practices of mobile phone service providers.

At a Senate hearing recently, the telecommunications firms offered to extend expiration of prepaid loads.

NTC commissioner Ruel Canobas said the new rules were arrived at following consultation with the telecommunications companies and other stakeholders.

Amid calls from the Senate for an improvement in the current mobile phone service regime, the NTC issued the new circular as well as four other new rules in the next few weeks aimed at reducing the cost of and improving the quality of cellular phone services in the country.

NTC officials underwent intense grilling from the senators after Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile complained that his cellular phone load mysteriously disappeared one day. His service provider, Globe Telecom, produced a record of his recent transactions, which showed that he or the user of his phone downloaded content that caused a reduction in his load balance.

Under Memorandum Circular No. 03-07-2009 issued yesterday, prepaid loads with higher value shall have longer expiration or validity period while those with lower values will have shorter validity periods.

Prepaid loads of P10 or lower will have a minimum validity or expiration period of three days while loads of P10 to P50 will be valid for 15 days. Loads of P50 to P100 will expire not earlier than 30 days while those of P100 to P150 will be valid for not less than 45 days.

The new rules also require that loads of P150 to P250 shall have a minimum expiration period of 60 days while prepaid loads of P250 to P300 shall be valid for not less than 75 days. Loads exceeding P300 shall have a validity of not less than 120 days.

The validity period of the prepaid load shall commence upon receipt of confirmation of the prepaid load purchased.

The remaining validity period for unused load shall be added to the validity of new load purchased.

This means the new minimum validity or expiry period shall be based on the sum of the new load and the unused load.

For instance, if a subscriber has an unused load of P2 and a P10 new load is purchased, the new validity or expiry period shall be 15 days.

The NTC also required telcos not to charge their subscribers for inquiring about their load balances through text messages.

In justifying the new rules, the commission cited its previous circular NTC MC 05-06-2007 which provides that a subscriber can only be charged according to the rates, terms and conditions he has agreed to. The same circular also provided that subscribers of prepaid telecommunications services shall be provided with a free mechanism to verify the remaining balance for his/her subscribed service.

The NTC also cited its MC No. 04-06-2007 which required public telecommunications entities to retain the call data records of voice calls and similar records for non-voice traffic.