NCC’s ‘Do Not Disturb’ Code records over 2.7 million subscribers
Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has continued to strengthen efforts to further equip subscribers against unsolicited text messages, as the number of subscribers to the ‘Do Not Disturb’ (DND) code 2442 are getting close to three million.
The Commission, on March 15, 2017, launched a major campaign of awareness to enlighten subscribers about issues and solutions available to them that will enable them enjoy their services.
Among these solutions is the Do-Not-Disturb Code which enables subscribers who do not want to receive unsolicited text messages to simply text STOP to 2442 in any of the networks.
The Executive Vice Chairman of NCC, Professor Umar Danbatta in his presentation during Thursday’s ATCON sectorial virtual forum with the theme “Meeting the Interests of Government, Consumers and Telecom and ICT Companies in the Era of COVID-19 and Post COVID-19 Pandemic for Digital Economy Development”, disclosed that this year, the number of DND users stands at 22,722,366, which represents an increase by 525,654 compared to the total number of users as at December 2019 which was 22,196,712.
Danbatta pointed out that the Do Not Disturb (DND) facility has significantly helped the consumers to control unsolicited text messages.
In addition to its consumer centric regulatory approach, he said that the Commission has, so far, issued a number of regulatory directions to operators.
According to him, they include the direction on data roll-over, which enables consumers to roll over unused data for period of time, ranging from one day to seven days, depending on their data plan; and the direction on forceful subscription of data services and VAS, which directs service providers to desist from forceful/automatic renewal of data services without prior consent of subscribers.
He explained that all these have continued to positively impact on the consumer’s quality of experience (QoE), stressing that the Commission will not relent on ensuring operators’ compliance with service level agreement with respect consumer complaints management.
He stated that in 2019, for instance, the NCC revised its Consumer Complaints & Service Level Agreement (CC/SLA) for the purpose of improving consumer complaint management and resolution by the service providers in a much prompter manner.
Danbatta said that 26,169 complaints were received from the number of telecom subscribers using NCC’s Toll Free Line 622 between 2019 and July 2020.
He noted that out of the number, 25,572 representing 98 per cent of the complaint have been successfully resolved, while the remaining 597 representing two per cent were escalated.
It will also be recalled that the focus of the NCC’s Industry Consumer Advisory Forum (ICAF)’s Open Forum held in the fourth quarter of 2019 was tailored on how to further protect the consumers with respect to financial frauds committed by criminals using telecoms platforms.
