CLARO and Telecom Providers - FCC taking action on overcharging

It seems no sooner had I written my article on Telecoms Provider sending SMS (Short Messaging Service) or “text” messages to alert Customers and Subscribers of the coming of “overcharges”  or sudden increases on their Mobile, modem and landline bills that Chairman of the FCC, Julius Genachowski had released a study recently commissioned by the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) as detailed in the article “FCC says consumers are 'bill shocked'”, published May 26, 2010 9:41 AM PDT by Marguerite Reardon CNET News - Signal Strength.

In this study it states that one in six (1 in 6) Americans, or nearly thirty million (30,000,000) American citizens have experience unexplained spikes in their bills unrelated to changes that had made or requested on their relevant calling plans.

84% stated that their Telecom Provider did not contact them when they were about to exceeded their Mobile phones plan allotted minutes, texts or modem caps and worse, 88% of the Telecoms Providers did not make contact with their Customers and Subscribers after the increased bills had been sent out.

Here in Jamaica, at least LIME contacts UltraPak (PostPaid) Customers and Subscribers when their bill is due, but like Verizon and the man with the US$18,000 bill, they do not contact Customers and Subscribers whenever they exceed their Mobile minutes and text allotments as well as their Mobile data caps either via calling or via SMS, the cost of the call or SMS being borne by the customer.

Thus if anyone had doubts that this was a real problem, this story effectively provides statistical evidence to put clothes on the argument as it relates to the effect of overcharging customers and their health.

Interestingly enough, the FCC is taking action. Joel Gurin, chief of the FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau has stated that there are plans underfoot to require that Telecoms Providers make it mandatory to send an SMS alerting Customers and Subscribers and of when they are about to go over their allotted minutes, texts and cap megabytes so that the Customers and Subscribers can brace for the increase.

A simple common courtesy that one would expect Telecom Providers would logically extend to its Customers and Subscribers, especially as the Recession show no signs of letting up any time soon and money is tight, even among Americans. But the other thing which he mentioned which brings peals of joy to my ears is the increased regulation of the Telecoms Providers.

This time with an emphasis on making their Contract Plans and Pre-paid offerings more transparent, in terms of indicating hidden costs and fees with the possibility of going as far as implementing transparent paperless billing which is part of a globally conscious trending towards companies appearing to be environmental conscious as stated in the article “Why all the requests for paperless billing lately?”, published September 24, 2009 8:16 AM PDT by Candace Lombardi CNET News - Green Tech.

A more simplified bill, as LIME, a subsidiary of C&W Plc has done in Jamaica via their launch of their MYLIME portal as stated in the article “LIME launches MYLIME Customer Portal” published Monday, 08 March 2010 by TechJamaica.com.

Telecoms Providers need to be more aware of the fact that the difficult economic times is making Customers and Subscribers think twice about splashing on Mobile Phone plans.

More and more Americans are opting to go Pre-Paid with Budget Carriers such as Sprint and MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operators) such as Leap Wireless, MetroPCS and Virgin Mobile getting the bulk of new Mobile phone subscriptions as stated in the article “Prepaid wireless outpaces contract services”, published April 5, 2010 3:35 PM PDT CNET News - Signal Strength by Marguerite Reardon as American seek to cut their costs.

Even typical big spenders on Mobile Phones such as Apple iPhones and Blackberries are now opting to have these high-end smart phones on a Pre-Paid monthly plan as stated in the article “Smart phones come to prepaid wireless market”, published May 19, 2010 4:00 AM PDT by Marguerite Reardon, CNET News - Signal Strength.

Albeit more expensive in terms of having to purchase the Mobile instrument as opposed to it being free under a contract is apparently preferable to Americans wary of higher ETF (Early Termination Fees) from the Big Four – AT&T, Verizon, Spring and T-Mobile.

Generally, it is felt among the Telecoms Providers that have Voice and Data Plans e.g. CLARO, that this is just a minor trending in the grand scheme of things, as eventually when the American Economy returns to better times, Contract Plans will also see resurgence, a point to which I agree, as Customers and Subscribers are fickle and will generally go where the better deal price during an Economy that has them jobless or earning less, hence they cut spending on perceived luxuries.

Therefore, it is a good bet that the trending towards Pre-Paid will not last for very long and by this observation, CLARO is best to also hold on to its use of Contract Plans.

To do otherwise would jeopardize its playing into the hands of the Senator Dwight Nelson, Minister of National Security and Justice and his intended implementation of MRSI (Mandatory Registration of Subscriber Information) as stated in the article “CLARO Backs Cell Phone Tracking Plan; Digicel, LIME in Wait-And-See Mode”, published Sunday May 16, 2010 by Mark Titus, Business Reporter, the Sunday Gleaner.

A move that will eventually lead to MNP (Mobile Number Portability), most desirable from CLARO’s point of view and which is priority as alluded to in the article “OUR signals policy shift on portability - Says Jamaica running out of phone numbers”, published Friday November 20, 2009 by Mark Titus, Business Reporter, The Jamaica Gleaner.

The proposal for which being slated to come to the attention of John Public’s in June 2010 as stated in the article “Paulwell calls for number portability”, published, Wednesday April 21, 2010, Daraine Luton, Senior Staff Reporter, The Jamaica Gleaner.

Thus Telecoms Providers in Jamaica, namely CLARO, Digicel and LIME would best to ride out this trend by sticking to their Contract Plan offerings but also make sure that they begins to offer more of the lower end brands phones and even smart phones on Pre-Paid [American] or flexible PostPaid [Jamaican] equivalent plans similar to LIME SupaPak (Pre-Paid) LIME UltraPak (PostPaid).

Even opting to offer less complicated Contract Plans similar to CLARO’s, with flexible part-payment for the phones, free 3G data phones upon the surrender of a Mobile phone from the competition once the users registers using Government of Jamaica identification i.e. NIS, TRN, Birth Certificate, Driver’s License with adjustments to the ETF to make it less onerous would be excellent.

Telecom Providers need to be as understanding to its Customer and Subscriber base as possible, making sure to implement a program by which Customers and Subscribers are informed via SMS whenever their Voice Plan minutes and text are about to be exceeded and when they are about to exceed their allotted caps on their Data Plans on their modems.

But already, there is the coming of Municipal Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Networks on the horizon that will successful compete with Telecom Providers and their 3G and Wimax 4G Mobile (IEEE 802.16m) Networks for the lucrative and now exploding Data Market using, ironically, head end originating from the very same Telecom Providers themselves.

Namely LIME ADSL (Asynchronous Digital Subscriber Line) and FLOW Internet………for which words I have written I will write at the appointed time on this growing phenomenon.