Telecom regulatory authority of India (TRAI) has recently made amendments to the mobile number portability rules and regulations. The new regulations, effective from May 3, will allow mobile subscribers to port their numbers anywhere in the country while changing service providers.
So, even if you are relocating from Delhi to Bangalore, one doesn’t need to change the number, as the new regulation will allow a mobile user to keep the same mobile number and weed out the hassle of buying another mobile connection on moving to another service area.
According to the laws applicable at the moment, consumers can change their service provider while retaining the same number, but, only within a telecom circle, which, mostly, is limited to a State.
According to a statement issued by the TRAI, “…issued sixth amendment to the Telecommunication Mobile Number Portability Regulation, 2009, which will facilitate full Mobile Number Portability (MNP) in the country, with effect from May 3, 2015.”
The regulator also issued two more amendments in case the subscriber opting for MNP has defaulted the payment to the donor operator (the one from whose network the subscriber is opting out).
1. If a subscriber porting out of a network defaults on payments to the donor operator, the latter will have to give a notice within 30 days of due date of payment of its outstanding bill. After a lapse of 60 days, the donor operator will not be entitled to raise the issue of non-payment.
2. The recipient operator (to whose network the subscriber has opted for) will give a notice of 15 days to the subscriber to honour commitments to the donor operator, failing which, the recipient operator will disconnect the services.
Mobile number Portability was introduced in India in Jan 2011. According to the TRAI data, by December 2014, 142.98Mn MNP requests had been received by the authority, of which 3.49 Mn were made in dec 2014 alone.
The nationwide MNP was recommended by TRAI back in September 2013.
