Chairman of Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) Dr. Mohammed Yaseen Sunday said the PTA was actively monitoring the redressal of consumers’ problems and guidelines and regulations were being issued to the operators whenever regulator, intervention was required.“It also ensures level-playing field for all telecom operators and smooth growth of the telecom industry. Strict monitoring of the telecom operators’ services is being ensured and PTA is focusing on enhanced Quality of Services (QoS) being offered by telecom operators for the consumers,” he said in an exclusive interview with APP.
Dr Yaseen said PTA has recently concluded a detailed survey of mobile operators through state-of-the-art equipment which is based on the survey results of 5 mobile operators who have been issued show cause notices.
“Further action would be taken as per provisions of the law after the completion of hearing and other legal formalities. PTA has formulated Consumer Protection Regulations and Regulations on Spam, Unsolicited Fraudulent and Obnoxious Communication to protect telecom subscribers from unwanted and wrong calls or SMS,” he added.
PTA has been working closely with the mobile operators to address the issue of provision of quality services to the consumers and few new services such as “Call block” has been introduced by the operators, he elaborated. Responding to a question about new industry trends, Dr. Yaseen said that broadband services were showing continuous upward trends bringing overall improvement in the telecommunication sector of Pakistan.
“The focus is being laid on content development for effective utilization of broadband services in the developmental activities across the country especially in the rural areas. Broadband has shown 115 percent growth in the last year and there are currently 0.58 million broadband users and they are growing leaps and bounds,” he added.
The Chairman PTA said the telecom subscribers have registered 0.74 million complaints regarding discrepancies in the SIM ownership while on the basis of these complaints more than 2.2 million SIMs have been removed from their names, 0.818 million SIMs regularized and 0.416 million have been blocked since the launch of this system in October 2009.
“SIM data of consumers is being corrected and the whole process is expected to be completed by the middle of the current year. Once the data is cleaned, it would resolve the issue of documentation of all legitimate users of telecom networks,” he added.
Dr. Mohammed Yaseen said that PTA was closely working with the State Bank of Pakistan to introduce unified Third Party Switch Regulations for Mobile Banking.
“Once finalized, these regulations would enable all banks and telecom operators to mutually offer mobile banking services,” he added.
The PTA Chairman said that despite a difficult year, the telecom sector has shown positive growth in the year 2008-09 and PTA is satisfied with the growth of the sector.
“Teledensity of the country grew by about 5 percent in the year 2008-09 and reached 62 at percent. The telecom revenue grew by 19.8 percent in 2008-09 which is an encouraging sign. Similarly, the cellular mobile sector has shown 7.2 percent growth in its subscription where all cellular mobile companies added over 6.3 million subscribers in the year 2008-09,” remarked PTA Chief.
He said the telecom sector invested over US$ 1.6 billion in the year 2008-09 and attracted over US$ 815 million which was 22 percent of total FDI in the country.
“Telecom Sector contributed over Rs.112 billion in national exchequer in the form of taxes and duties. Pakistan’s economy is already on the road to recovery and I hope that the telecom sector would grow further in the coming years,” he concluded.
To a question regarding the performance of “SIM Information System 668”, Chairman PTA termed the initiative a “great success” in correcting the data of mobile users.
“Figures show that mobile subscribers are seeking details of number of SIMs in their names along with operator name through SMS and PTA website link. So far, 10.5 million queries have been received through SMS while 4.8 million through PTA website including from Pakistanis living abroad,” he concluded.
Via APP
