An NGO involved in consumer rights advocacy is preparing the grounds to approach the higher authorities to regulate the COVID-19 messages that one is forced to hear while making a telephone call each time.
This is on the grounds that the man-hours lost and the economic loss incurred by hearing the same message each time a call is made during the day, was staggering while it no longer served the purpose of educating the public. It was in the first week of March that the Government of India had directed the telecom service providers to change the default ringtone and precede it with messages on the imperatives of maintaining social distance and ensuring use of hand sanitisers.
But, nine months later there has been no signs of the pre-call messages being reduced which has irked a large section of the subscribers and consumer rights groups are now toying with the idea of approaching the relevant authorities to regulate it.
Bhamy V. Shenoy, a consumer rights activist and Governing Council member of Consumer Voice, said a calculation by Mysuru-based social activist Roy Joseph indicated that India was losing nearly 2.5 crore man-hours every day. And if one attributed even ₹50 per hour, then the loss works out to around ₹125 crore per day or ₹45,625 crore per year.
These figures are broad indicators and based on the assumption that 100 crore subscribers make three calls a day and have to listen to the 30-second audio every time they make a call. This translates to 2.5 crore hours per day and at ₹50 per hour it amounts to ₹125 crore per day, as per the rough calculation which has not factored in the cost of power to recharge the phones for three crore hours, according to Mr. Shenoy.
He said Consumer Voice, which is a national-level voluntary action group of academicians and professionals constantly working to raise awareness on consumer rights and laws, was taking up the issue with the Telephone Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) or with the decision makers at a higher level.
The existing technology should be able to stop giving the message after a mobile phone user has heard it 10 or 5 times in a month or it could be restricted to the first two calls a day rather than forcing the subscribers to listen to it every time, according to Mr. Shenoy.
Consumer Voice activists aver that there was growing consensus that what started as a good cause has now become a nuisance. In addition to the man-hours wasted, it had ceased to serve as an educative tool, according to Mr. Shenoy. “It worked fine in the initial stages but given the public apathy to social distancing and use of masks, this is no longer working and even if the messages are changed and made relevant, people tend to ignore it as it is seen as a source of annoyance,”
