TRAI issue directives for DTH Operators in India

Direct to Home Broadcasting Services (Standards of Quality of Service and Redressal of Grievances) Regulation, 2007

This is great news for the existing and prospective customers of DTH services in India. Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has just issued several key directives for the DTH operators to ensure subscribers quality of service.

One of the key directive is that the companies would have to offer their subscribers an option to ask for refunds on DTH equipment if they choose to discontinue the service.

This is pretty awesome considering existing DTH customers would now get an option to move on to rival service providers if they provide better services at lower costs.

SUN TV, Reliance Blue Magic and Bharti Telemedia are three new players expected to launch their DTH operations in the coming months.

TRAI has also now instructed the DTH companies to offer the equipment on rental scheme if the customer so desire. Currently both Tata Sky and Zee Dish TV requires the customer to purchase the Set Top Box and other equipment to get the connection.

Another impressive feature is that the DTH players in the market would no longer be able to discontinue any of its channels without prior information to subscribers.

They are also being told to not disable the STB owned by the customer in case he does pay for the paid channels. This means that the customers would still be able to use the device to access Free To Air channels.

DTH Companies would also be barred from changing the prices of the packages being offered to a subscriber for a period of six months.

DTH Operators have also been told to establish call centers with sufficient capacity to handle the load of the calls from their customers. The numbers for these call centers would have to be Toll Free.

The new regulations further said that No complaint can be pending beyond 5 days and all billing complaints will have to be redressed by the DTH companies within seven days.

Of course, these rulings are not going to please the DTH service providers in the country as they are being made accountable for their services to the customer.

However, the good thing is that more customers are now likely to opt for DTH services as they would have more freedom to opt for a particular service provider. They are no longer locked to a company just because they pay for the equipment in full!