On 7 August 2017 the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa)
published the first draft of the End-User and Subscriber Service Charter Regulations
for interested stakeholders to make their comments and inputs on specific sections of
the Regulations. It received 20 submissions. Upon consideration of the submissions
received from stakeholders, Icasa decided to publish a second draft of Regulations for
further stakeholder consultation.
“The review of the Regulations was necessitated by general concerns raised by
various stakeholders, including consumer groups and social media campaigns, with
regards to data expiry rules, high out-of-bundle rates and rules and also out-of-
bundle voice and SMS rules currently applied by licensees,’ says Icasa councillor
Botlenyana Mokhele.
These concerns range from consumer complaints about the unfairness arising from
the premature expiry of data bundles and/or forfeiture of unused data if it is not used
within a particular period.
Key interventions
The key interventions in terms of the draft regulation published are the following:
•Expiry of data – all licensees are required to provide prepaid data bundles with
minimum expiry period of 3 years, save where such prepaid data bundles have been
exhausted prior to the expiry of 3 years.
•Out of bundle billing – licensees are required to send usage notifications for data
depletion to end-users, and the intervals must show 50 per cent, 75 per cent, 90 per
cent and 100 per cent service depletion. The notification must be through an SMS,
push notification or any other applicable means.
•Rollover of unused minutes and/or data – where a network provider is required to
provide an option to post-paid users to roll over unused monthly data allocation to the
next billing period or to transfer the monthly data allocation or a portion thereof to
another end-user on the same network.
•End-users must be given an option to opt-in or opt-out of being charged out of
bundle data rates to avoid bill shock.
All interested stakeholders have until 3 January 2018 to submit their written
comments or representations to Icasa for consideration. Icasa will then hold public
hearings on the matter from 7 to 9 February 2018 and it is anticipated that the final
Regulations will be promulgated by 31 March 2018.
“We would like to encourage all interested parties to comment on the draft
Regulations and to actively part take in the ensuing public participation processes,’
concludes Mokhele.
Source: Bizcommunity.co
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