The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has amended the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference Regulations (TCCCPR), 2018 to further strengthen consumer protection against Unsolicited Commercial Communication (UCC). The revised regulations aim to deal with evolving methods of misuse of telecom resource and promote a more transparent commercial communication ecosystem for consumers.

Since its implementation, TCCCPR-2018 has made breakthrough use of technology for spam control through blockchain-based regulatory framework. Despite the robust measures in place, spammers have evolved their tactics, necessitating further regulatory enhancements to safeguard consumer interests. Accordingly, TRAI issued a Consultation Paper (CP) on the Review of the TCCCPR 2018 on August 28, 2024 to seek stakeholders’ views on key regulatory amendments needed to enhance consumer protection and curb UCC. The consultation focused on several vital issues, including redefining commercial communication categories, strengthening consumer complaint redressal mechanisms, tightening the threshold norms for action against UCC, bringing in higher accountability of senders and telemarketers, curbing the misuse of 10-digit numbers for telemarketing, implementing stricter measures against unregistered telemarketers (UTMs), etc.

The latest amendments build upon stakeholder feedback and extensive internal deliberations to reinforce consumer rights and prevent misuse of telecom resources while at the same time aiming that the legitimate commercial communication occur through registered entities, based on the preference and consent of the customers, thereby, balancing the interests of consumers with the need for supporting legitimate economic activities in the country.

Some of the salient features of the consumer-centric amendments made to the regulations include:

  • Ease of reporting spam and revamped complaint mechanism: Consumers will now be able to make complaint against UCC calls and messages sent by unregistered senders without the need of first registering their preferences for blocking or receiving commercial communications. Further, a customer can now make a complaint about spam/ UCC within 7 days of receiving spam as compared to earlier 3-day time limit.
  • Empowering customers: Improved mechanism for opting out from promotional communication: Telecom operators must now provide a mandatory option in the promotional messages using which a customer may opt out of receiving such messages, thereby, making preference modification simpler and easier for the consumers.
  • Stringent measures against spammers/ senders of UCC: In case of failure of the access providers to implement these regulations, provisions for imposing financial disincentives in graded manner have been introduced. A financial disincentive (FD) of Rs 0.2 million for first instance of violation, Rs 0.5 million for second instance of violation and Rs 1 million per instance for subsequent instances of violation, shall be imposed on access providers in case of misreporting of the count of UCC.
  • Strengthening the ecosystem: Access providers are mandated to analyse call and SMS patterns based on parameters such as unusually high call volumes, short call durations, and low incoming-to-outgoing call ratios. This will help flag potential spammers in real-time.

TRAI has mandated that Access Providers to ensure strict compliance with these new regulations and take proactive measures to identify and block violators.