About 81,000 Complaints Against Telecom Operators in 2015: Prasad

Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said the Department of Telecom (DoT) received 57,634 complaints in 2015 compared with 50,197 in the previous year.

Meanwhile, complaints received by telecom regulator Trai increased to 23,313 last year, as against 18,494 in 2014.

The minister was replying to a question if there is an increase in the number of consumers' complaints about bills, connectivity, mobile portability, harassment and so on against the mobile service providers.

"There is slight increase in consumer complaints against few mobile service providers," Prasad said in a written reply to Lok Sabha.

According to data shared by the minister, there is an increase in complaints received by DoT against operators like Airtel, BSNL, MTS and Videocon. However, complaints against Idea, MTNL, Reliance, Tata, Uninor and Vodafone have declined.

Complaints received by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) against all telcos, barring Tata and Uninor, have increased.

On action taken by government, Prasad said complaints received by DoT and Trai are being forwarded to concerned service providers for their resolution.

"For effective resolution of consumer complaints, Trai has laid down the standards of quality of service parameters relating to time limit for fault repair, billing complaints, refund of security deposits and rent rebate for delayed fault repair," he said.

Trai has been monitoring the performance of service providers against the benchmarks for these parameters through quarterly performance monitoring reports submitted by the service providers, the minister said.

"Wherever the quality of service benchmark is not met, financial disincentives are imposed so that the service providers improve their performance," he said.

The minister said Trai has issued Telecommunication Mobile Number Portability (Fourth Amendment) Regulations, 2012, providing financial disincentives for unjustified rejection of porting request and for violation of timeline specified in the regulations.

"Government PSUs (BSNL/ MTNL) are using social media for receiving complaints and suggestions from customers for better customer satisfaction," Prasad added.