NCC made the pledge at its t 98th Consumer Outreach Programme held in
Yenagoa, Bayelsa capital.
Alhaji. Ismail Adedigba, Deputy Director of the Consumer Affairs Bureau
of NCC noted that the event was to provide telecom consumers with necessary
tools to protect them from market exploitation and fraud.
Adedigba, said the NCC through its regulatory mandate ensures that the
consumer is the "King" as such must be accorded their rights which
include the right to be heard, right to be educated, right to choose, right to
Safety.
.
Adedigba said the decision of the NCC to initiate regular consummer-operator-regulator
meetings was based on the complaints.
He said the complains were about unsolicited text messages and calls,
failure/refusal to roll over unused data at the expiration of data bundles by
service providers.
Others are, automatic renewal of data services upon expiration and
activation/subscription to data and value added services (VAS)
without prior consent of the subscribers and call masking.
He said the NCC in response to the complaints developed a 2442 DND
short code to solve unsolicited text messages, ad warned operators to
desist from making bogus offers to their subscribers.
"At NCC, our objectives is to ensure that consumers get value for
thir money, and we acted by issuance of direction to service provider on Data
Roll over .
“The directive now enables consumers to roll over unused data for period
of time, ranging from 1day to 7days, depending on the subscriber’s data plan. It
took effect from 21st of May, 2018." He said
More than 2,000 telecom consumers turned up for the event.
They were taken through necessary tools that will allow them make
rational and informed decisions when making choice of services, including the
new toll free number 622 for complaints to the NCC.
The Director of Consumer Affairs Bureau of the NCC, Mrs. Felicia
Onquegbuchulam, spoke on the theme "Using information and education
as tools for consumer empowerment and Protection.
She said the consumer Outreach programme is one of the
initiatives of the NCC to bring together Telecom subscriber in the rural
areas with the Network operators and the regulators.
She said the aim is to discuss, proffer solutions to consumers related
issues and ensure consumers have the value for money through effective service
delivery.
"The forum seeks to educate Telecom consumers and other
stakeholders of contemporary issues generating interest in the industry”
“It also also serves as a feedback mechanism for the commission in
making regulatory interventions for the benefit of the consumers and the
service providers as well as the industry as a whole," Onwueguchulam said.
The consumers who ldged several complains at the complains desk
applauded NCC for the event and urged them to make it a regular one.
Mr Tonye Yemoleigha who noted that the base stations in the state were
spilling diesel into the surroundings as well as noisy operation of the
generating sets at base stations.
He urged NCC to ensure that operators complied to the guidelines on the
location of base stations.
No comments:
Post a Comment