The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has released a consultation paper on review of quality of service (QoS) parameters for basic and cellular mobile telephone services. The review was necessitated by the fact that the long-term period set for achieving the QoS benchmarks (36 months for cellular services and 48 months for basic services) is over and the performance of the operators based on these benchmarks has not been satisfactory.

TRAI, which has been monitoring the QoS of basic and cellular operators based on the parameters laid down by it, called for the review after discussions with the service providers. It incorporated some of the suggestions of the basic service operators in the consultation paper proposals. Meanwhile, the independent agency appointed by TRAI to conduct the QoS survey for mobile services too recommended a review of some QoS parameters in light of the new developments in the mobile sector since 2000, when the parameters were specified (for example, CDMA mobile telephony). These recommendations have been included in the consultation paper.

For mobile services, the consultation paper reviews the implementation of the present QoS parameters and presents a number of issues raised by the service providers. It discusses the need for prescribing new parameters and the measures needed for effective implementation of the QoS benchmarks, including the possibility of imposing penalties in case of violation of the QoS parameters.

Background
The TRAI Act mandates the authority to “lay down the standards of quality of service to be provided by service providers to ensure a certain level of quality of service”.

The regulator conducted periodic surveys of services in order to protect consumer interests. The objectives were to:

  • create conditions for customer satisfaction by making known the QoS that the service provider is required to provide and the user has the right to expect;
  • measure the QoS provided by the service providers from time to time and to compare it with the norms so as to assess the level of performance; and
  • generally protect the interests of telecom consumers.

Under these provisions of the TRAI Act, the authority had notified the Regulation on Quality of Services of Basic and Cellular Mobile Telephone Services. The QoS standards were finalised after extensive consultations with the stakeholders and were based on the QoS standards in the licences of the new entrants following prevalent international practices.

During the last four years of implementation of the QoS Regulation, it has been observed from the performancemonitoring reports submitted by basic service operators and the recommendations of the independent agency appointed by TRAI to conduct QoS surveys on parameters related to fault incidences, that the performance was way below the prescribed benchmarks in several areas. This is more so in the case of the incumbent operators, namely, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL), as they have extensive legacy copper network with little network upgradation over the last few years. The benchmarks for cellular services were prescribed based on the GSM MoU. However, with the emergence of CDMA technology in a big way in the last few years, parameters needed to be stipulated for CDMA technology as well. It could be similar for both networks.

Further, over the last four years of the implementation of the QoS Regulation, TRAI has observed that there is an increasing necessity to delete some of the parameters, as they are no longer relevant in the present scenario. A study of international practices on prevailing QoS standards in Malaysia, Singapore and Australia also reveals that some of the standards in these countries are quite comparable with those prevailing in India while some of the Indian QoS standards may require modification as they seem to be stringent in the prevailing conditions.

In view of the above, the authority believed that a need had arisen to review the implementation of the existing QoS parameters.

Review proposal
After initial consultations, TRAI has suggested certain changes for both basic and cellular service providers. It has asked the service providers to present their views by the end of March 2005. Also, to ensure efficacy of the existing parameters to maintain appropriate quality of service, the authority has proposed some additional parameters to assess the network operational performance of service providers.

Finally, TRAI has noted that although it can recommend to the government that penal action be taken for violation of licence conditions, including failure to meet QoS standards, it does not have any specific powers to take penal action in case service providers do not adhere to the QoS standards. The absence of TRAI’s power to directly take penal action on erring service providers has resulted in making the regulation ineffective. TRAI, therefore, feels it should have powers to directly impose penalties on service providers not meeting QoS benchmarks. It has cited international practice in this regard.