A invoice mandating telecommunication companies to grant refund to its prospects for poor service has been filed on the House of Representatives.
Representatives Paolo Duterte of Davao metropolis, Eric Yap of Benguet, Jocelyn Tulfo and Edvic Yap of ACT-CIS party-list and Ralph Tulfo of Quezon City filed House Bill 8480 which obliges telecommunication corporations refund prospects who skilled intermittent or steady service disruption for twenty-four hours or extra in a month.
The invoice stated that subscribers ought to solely pay for the service they get so telecom companies will probably be prompted to supply quick, dependable and uninterrupted web connection.
“While the telecommunications industry has continued to flourish in the country, internet connection and reliability of service remains a persistent problem, along with exorbitant costs paid by consumers for internet service,” Duterte stated in an announcement.
The authors of the invoice additionally cited of their explanatory observe that the Philippines is among the nations with the costliest fastened broadband providers in Asia, leading to its low rating within the 2022 Digital Quality of Life Index (DQLI) independently carried out by the cybersecurity agency Surfshark.
The Philippines ranked 98th within the 2022 DQLI, by way of web affordability, down by 26 notches from its equally low rating of 72nd in 2021.
“ISPs (internet service providers) and public telecommunications entities (PTE) concerned should not require the customer to take any action in order to receive a refund credit or bill adjustment,” in line with the invoice.
The invoice will amend Republic Act 7925 or the Public Telecommunications Policy Act enacted 28 years in the past.
Telecom companies and ISPs discovered by the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) to be in violation the invoice’s provisions will probably be fined between P200,000 to P2 million.
For violators whose gross annual revenue are P10 million and beneath, the penalty will probably be equal to 1 % to 2 % of their gross annual revenue.
Repeated violations are additionally penalized beneath the invoice with revocation of the PTE’s provisional authority or certificates of public comfort and necessity, or the cancellation of the registration of the ISP, whichever applies, “including the waiver of pre-termination fees of affected subscribers and the timely disbursement of any remaining credits from excessive downtime.”—LDF, GMA Integrated News
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
