NTC to set rules for prepaid phone cards

The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) expects to come up next month with a set of rules for prepaid phone cards which will standardize the services being offered by telecom companies.

NTC Commissioner Joseph Santiago noted that at present, companies are free to adopt their existing rates and translate these into the phone card system.

But due to a huge number of complaints reaching the commission, Santiago said they decided to lay down the guidelines for prepaid cards.

He pointed out that since prepaid cards only became highly popular during the past few years, the NTC did not have the rules to govern their sale, rates and usage.

As a result, he said that some carriers are now charging by the second while others charge by the minute.

There are also those which do not have expiration dates in the phone cards and some which have expirations ranging from three months to one year, he added.

The public hearing on the proposed circular will be on Feb. 17. A second public hearing will depend on the reaction of the industry, he said.

The NTC called the carriers to a meeting on their prepaid card billing procedures two weeks ago upon a verbal instruction from Transportation and Communications Secretary Vicente Rivera for the regulatory body to look into the complaints against mobile phone companies.

"We've asked them to submit their billing procedure for the prepaid. Right now, we are doing a matrix of all their practices on the charging schemes. After this, we will come out with a circular to standardize all the prepaid. We expect this to finish this month and the circular to be out in March," he said.

He said NTC is bent on adopting the policy of either no expiration or an expiration ranging from two to five years unless the carriers could present a case on why it should not be that way.

Likewise, Santiago said they are planning to impose a billing period of not more than six months which will be sufficient for the traffic reports to come in, especially those on international calls.

Also, he said that the NTC would like the carriers to charge on a per second pulse as already being done by Pilipino Telephone Corp. (Piltel) so as to give the subscribers maximum value for what they pay for the service.

"What we're saying is if it would be very, very expensive for them, then let's strike a compromise. If not and we find the reasons flimsy then we'll issue a circular for a per second charging," he stressed.

Rogelio Quevedo, Smart head for legal carrier relations, though, pointed out that the removal of the expiration date will be grossly disadvantageous to the cellular phone operators.

He explained that under the proposal, the network will continue to carry the subscriber and yet not earn, anything.

"It's just practical that since money has been invested on the network, there should be a monthly carrying cost. You are gaining utility from your phone, whether for incoming or outgoing calls and therefore, you must pay for it," he said.

Quevedo added that the NTC should not push for standardization since such is contrary to the policy of liberalization and deregulation wherein the players are given the opportunity to be competitive.

"We are opposing more government interference in business now. Everything must take into consideration the cost of the network and the reasonable return of investment," he said. -