Say you are dis-satisfied with your current mobile provider, and would really like to change to another telecom operator who has a better plan, or a better coverage where you live / work, or your current operator is hopeless at customer relations; but you find that changing your number would be a big hassle because of the fact that your number would change and that is a pain. Telling assorted friends and family about your changed number could be a big problem and a lot of effort and frankly, you continue to live with your current operator because of this headache of number changing.
For some time now, there has been talk in the air about bringing number portability into India. This is a global concept where once you have a phone number in a country, you can retain the number even when you change your operator. Once operators know that you can retain your number and yet change the telecom provider, they tend to be more customer friendly, avoiding excess charges and making sure that they present their best foot to customers. This is one reason why telecom operators in India have been resisting such a measure since they know it would force them to be more customer-friendly. But now it looks like India will get the number portability system next year:
No one would have expected this. It was known that Indians are very irritated with the number of unwanted calls they get from tele-marketers, and hence most people welcomed the setting up a National Do Not Call Registry, but this would have been most unexpected. When the registry opened on September 5, 2007, it got 5 million users. This is an incredible number and demonstrates how much people are willing to go to avoid these unwanted calls.
The sheer numbers — around 2.5% of India’s over 190 million mobile subscribers — reveal just how much people resent pesky sales calls. Considering that prepaid subscribers — who are much less of a target for telemarketers — form a huge percentage of all subscribers, this figure of 5 million assumes even greater significance.
The sheer numbers — around 2.5% of India’s over 190 million mobile subscribers — reveal just how much people resent pesky sales calls. Considering that prepaid subscribers — who are much less of a target for telemarketers — form a huge percentage of all subscribers, this figure of 5 million assumes even greater significance.