Consumers score victory as NTC stops Smart, Piltel plan to ‘forcibly expire’ free text
Consumer advocacy group TXTPower scored a victory over telecom giants Smart Communications and Pilipino Telephone Corp. after the National Telecommunications Commission ordered the two firms to suspend plans to “forcibly expire” free text allocations and free airtime load to subscribers.
Smart and Piltel, operator of the Talk N Text brand, run the nation’s largest network and have the biggest number of subscribers among all networks.
“This is a victory for consumers sick and tired of big companies’ daily acts of abuse and disrespect,” said TXTPower spokesperson Anthony Ian Cruz. “The NTC should make their order permanent since we there’s no rhyme or reason in the plan of Smart and Piltel.”
In a letter dated January 22, NTC Commissioner Abraham Abesamis wrote TXTPower’s Cruz that government regulators have directed “Smart and Piltel to hold in abeyance the implementation of the expiration of free SMS together with the airtime on all e-load and regular top-up transactions until further orders from the Commission effective 15
January 2007.”
Abesamis also furnished TXTPower a copy of the NTC’s letter to Enrico Espanol of Smart and Piltel’s legal and regulatory department, which sought strict compliance to its order.
“Had consumers not complained, Smart and Piltel would have had a field day since January 15, 2007 in fleecing their subscribers who did not have full knowledge that they would be losing all the free text and free airtime load once their regular load expired.” said Cruz.
TXTPower contends that all so-called free text and free airtime load obtained by subscribers everytime they buy prepaid load are “not really free and form part of the total value of the prepaid load subscribers buy.”
Varying number of free text and minutes of free airtime are added on top of prepaid load and top-ups bought and paid by Smart and Piltel prepaid subscribers. Piltel only has prepaid subscribers while Smart’s prepaid customers constitute more than 90 percent of its subscriber
base.
“Ergo, any move by Smart and Piltel to forcibly expire these so-called free text and free airtime is tantamount to theft. This could mean millions of pesos of losses for consumers who were not even provided adequate and complete information by the telecom giants,” said Cruz.
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