Nuisance of marketing SMSs

Hasanullah, a 65-year-old surgery patient, was lounging in his hospital bed one afternoon when his peace was disturbed by a phone call.

The phone call was from his mobile operator and it was to inform him of the various offers the company was providing on data packages. Ruffled, the retired banker spoke very curtly to the operator's representative.

“I get about ten text messages a day from my operator about their offers, so what was the point of calling me?”

Not that Hasanullah is happy to receive the unsolicited text messages from his operator as well as from third parties. Allegations run rife that the third parties somehow manage customers' information from operators.

“Those marketing text messages distract me. They are of no use to me,” he added.

Hasanullah's grievance is shared by a large section of mobile phone subscribers, who complain that important text messages get buried under the deluge of messages from the operators and businesses. 

Khaled Hossain, a subscriber, yesterday said he received a marketing SMS at 6:30am.

“This is a regular phenomenon. Because of this, I have to keep my phone on a silent mode when I am sleeping. But this can't be a solution because I may miss out important calls and text messages.” 

However, mobile operators said they are sending text messages to their customers in accordance with the directives of the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission.

“Customers may opt out any time from receiving promotional SMS, voice call or bulk SMS containing a message,” said Mahmud Hossain, chief corporate affairs officer of Grameenphone.

Subscribers can block promotional SMS free of cost by calling GP's hotline 121 and opting for the 'Do Not Disturb' service. A non-governmental organisation yesterday sent a legal notice to the BTRC and the secretary of the Telecom Division to take lawful action to rein in unwanted SMSs.

Tanjim Al Islam, a lawyer of the Supreme Court, said there is no clause of protection from these unwanted SMSs.

“Even the BTRC has no policy on sending SMSs and we are feeling discomfort about this,” said Islam, who has sent the notice in favour of VOICE, a rights organisation.

Islam said, every day he receives 20 to 30 SMSs from operators and many more from third parties.

Ekram Kabir, vice-president for communications and corporate responsibility at Robi, said informing customers about the latest offers and services is a global best practice.

“We maintain our relationship with customers through SMS. We are also monitoring total SMS transmitted to ensure that our valued customers do not receive too many texts,” he added.

Md Jahurul Haque, legal commissioner of BTRC, said the telecom regulator noticed the issue earlier but has not found any proper solution yet.

“We will place the issue in the next commission meeting and hopefully we will get a positive solution,” he said.

In 2013, the BTRC has drafted a guideline on 'don't disturb policy (DND)'. All the top operators said they have implemented the policy, meaning customers can opt out from any service -- including SMSs.

“By subscribing to the DND service, a subscriber may choose not to receive any marketing or promotional SMS. Recently, we have also ensured that all our post-paid subscribers are under the DND service by default,” Kabir said.

Apart from SMS and voice calls from customer centres, users also get bill shock from value-added services (VASs) that they never signed up for.

“In most of the cases it gets revealed that customers intentionally or unintentionally activate a certain service resulting in a subscription fee deduction,” said Asif Ahmed, communications director at Banglalink.

However, Mahbuba Sultana, who works for a private company, said she had blocked some offers a few months ago but recently she received bills against her numbers for some infotainment VASs.

“I use my mobile network to only make some phone calls. I do not use any VAS but I still get charged every month,” she added.

Industry insiders said sometimes VAS-providers automatically activate the service to boost their earnings and in a few cases mobile operators have taken action against them.

Ahmed said Banglalink is a compliant company and is guided by a strong code of conduct.

“If any of our partners are found guilty, we take prompt action as severe as immediate termination of contract.”

He said if someone is not willing to subscribe to any VAS, Banglalink subscribers can deactivate them immediately by sending free SMS to 6888 with the message <STOP ALL>.

Grameenphone said VAS is designed keeping customers' interest as a priority. VAS is activated only after multiple confirmations from customers to protect against accidental activation.

However, following complaints, the Directorate of National Consumer Rights Protection (DNCRP) slapped penalty on the top three mobile operators for duping their customers with different offers.

In separate cases, Robi was fined Tk 6.65 lakh, Grameenphone Tk 2.50 lakh and Banglalink Tk 25,000.

But after the fines, the operators filed a writ petition with higher courts. The petition has not been settled yet.

Because of the writ petition, the DNCRP is not able to take actions although it has received huge number of complaints, said Md Shafiqul Islam Laskar, director general of the agency.

However, Grameenphone's Hossain said according to the Customers' Right Protection Act, customers have the right to lodge complaints against any service provider. “And we respect the right.”

There are 13.93 crore active mobile connections in Bangladesh. Of them, 7.19 crore have access to internet as of May, according to the BTRC.