Government should not succumb to the pressure of telecom service providers

Whether the move of telecom service providers for not supplying hard copy bills to consumers for telecom connection is really for saving paper? 

The telecom industry in India is initiating a move to deregulate supply of post paid bills in hard copy to telecom subscribers and it is surprising that TRAI also seems to be considering the same even though supply of hard copy bill is laid down in Indian Telegraph Act, 1885. TRAI has already issued consultation paper for the same. The main reason behind such a move has been indicated to save cutting of trees for paper usage being used in delivery of printed bills by telecom companies to the consumers. 

While it is a welcome initiative of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) to place an environmental friendly system to save cutting of trees for paper usage being used in delivery of printed bills by telecom companies to the consumers, therefore, we should encourage dispensing with use of paper for hard copy generation of paper bills in the telecom sector. However, for the reasons as stated below, it is opined that the dispensing with requirement of hard copy bills may be adapted as an optional instead of completely stopping delivery of hard copies bills as India is yet to be ready with adaption of digital technologies. 

1.   The responsibility of printing of bills in the consultation paper looks to be shifting from the service provider to the consumers as many of the consumers in the following category of consumers would still be printing the bills:

a)    The landline connections installed in Govt. offices, private offices, and residential landline connections allotted to officials of Government Departments, PSUs, Autonomous Departments, and Universities etc.

b)    The senior citizens being not comfortable with reading and verification on computers/mobiles and their mindset to retain the copies for long time as the integrity of service providers’ w.r.t billing is still not trustworthy.  The consumers are not still being given rebate for the landline being dead for even months and complaints being closed on 3^rd day of the complaint without even being attended to. The detailed itemised billing for long distance calls is required for verification and other purposes. Complaints do arise after lapse of many months about non-payment of very old outstanding and therefore they tend to keep the payment receipts also. A queue can be seen at the counters of telecom companies for making payments of the bills which indicates that the telecom subscribers are still not ready with adapting to digital technology.

c)   The employees working in even private companies are being reimbursed for mobile connections and therefore the requirement of hard copies and payment receipts do exists.

d)    The self employed people and the consultants engaged in the companies do take exemption applicable as per Income Tax Act on their expenditures incurred in communications and therefore require hard copies for assessment at a later date.

e)    The citizens constituting rural population, disadvantageous group of societies

f)     Many of the Citizens even do not have email ids, internet banking etc.  It is already stated in the consultation paper that many citizens in significant percentage even do not have smart phones. An example could be seen at Reservation Counters of railways where lot of people are still seen to be standing in queue at ticket booking counters of Indian Railways to book a ticket, cancellation etc. when the facility of online ticket booking is available. The statistics reflects that 45% of the passengers who travelled by Rail booked tickets at PRS counters* during 2014-15.  Had they been comfortable with digital technology, definitely would not have preferred to go to ticket counters and stand in queue for hours.

g)    India is still not ready to handle complaints of cyber hacking in an effective, speedy and efficient manner. Even the complaints of cyber frauds are not being registered at the police station as there is a strong resistance from the police to register such cases. We are still not ready with digitization of citizen centric services as well as system to handle cyber frauds. Therefore most of the citizens would be reluctant to go to cyber cafe and download the bill and make payments digitally.  

h)    As per statistics* available on public domain, India a country of more than 1250 million population is likely to have 775 million mobile users in India. As against 775 million mobile users, the number of internet users is likely to be around 480 million. An inference can be drawn from such huge gap between population of the country, number of mobile users and internet users and the inference could be that around 50% of the population is still not having internet connections i.e. around 300 million people may not be comfortable or confident with working on mobile internet due to affordability acceptability or cyber security or may be using only the basic feature phone. Network congestion is another problem which could lead to the problem of the amount getting debited from the accounts but not being credited to the merchant. We still not have a robust complaint handling system to handle such problems in an efficient manner. It still takes around two to four weeks in getting the refunds

                      In view of the above, the desired saving on tree cutting for the purpose of paper manufacturing does not hold true 100% as being stated by the service providers. In fact it looks that the cost of hard copy bill generation is being proposed to be shifting from service provider to the consumer. Therefore the existing practice of hard copy bill is continued. The consumer may be offered an option to subscribe for soft copy bill instead of completely dispensing with hard copy bills. The consumers may be offered with a rebate of Rs. 10/- per bill in case of opting for soft copy bill. The amount of the rebate is being suggested as the same amount is expected to be saved if not printed and delivered to the consumer at his address.

                       The telecom companies started misleading the consumers long back asking them to pay Rs. 50/- per month, if the consumers desire to get hard copy bill. Even the companies on their own stopped delivery of hard copies bills without taking any consent from the consumers.

                    The rebate as suggested above could be considered by the consumer as an incentive to get encouraged for shifting from hard copy bill to soft copy bill. Initially the incentive by way of rebate shall continue for a period of at least one year. The option for reconversion from soft copy bill to hard copy could be restored in case the consumer does not find it to be comfortable with soft copy bill and digital payments. Soft copy bill may be sent as an attachment to the email without passwords etc. instead of advising consumer to download from the websites requiring user id and password.  Initially, an option to subscribe for soft copy bill be given to the consumers as to whether they would like to opt for soft copy bill by email. The delivery of  hard copy should be a default option. There should be an easy procedure to change the option from hard copy to soft copy and vice versa at any point of time. Any change in the request should be got confirmed/ consented explicitly from the consumer registered email id or the mobile number before making it effective from the subsequent billing cycle. The soft copy bill should also accompany with itemised billing details for long distance and international calls. 

                     In view of the above:   

1.    The distribution of bills to the post paid consumers should continue with both options i.e hard copy bill and soft copy bill through email.

2.    The existing consumers may be given an option to switch over from hard copy bill to soft copy bill with a rebate of Rs. 10/- per month if opting for soft copy bill.

3.    The rebate of Rs. 10/- per month should be for a minimum period of 12 months or till a period the consumer continues to receive soft copy bill whichever is earlier..

4.    The consumer should have an option to switch back to hard copy bill at any point of time. The option of switching over from printed bill to soft copy bill and vice versa should be effective from the next billing cycle.

5.    The option to new consumers at the time of enrollment be given by default as hard copy bill with an option to soft copy bill by explicit consent under an informed consumer decision.