Wireless Carriers to Draft Consumer Rights Code
Wireless telephone companies including Verizon Wireless Services Inc. and Cingular Wireless will announce voluntary customer-rights standards for the industry in advance of plans by California regulators to impose such rules.
The Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Assn., an industry trade group that represents the wireless companies, will unveil its guidelines Tuesday in Washington. Carriers that adopt the 10 rules would have to include more disclosure in advertising and allow customers a 14-day trial period to cancel new service, said Kimberly Kuo, a spokeswoman for the group.
The association’s move will come a week before a scheduled vote by the California Public Utilities Commission on more extensive customer-rights regulations for the telecommunications industry. California, with 35 million people, is the largest U.S. telephone market.
The number of U.S. wireless phone users has more than doubled since 1998 to about 150 million as more consumers abandon land-based lines. Complaints about wireless carriers to federal regulators rose 38% to 4,119 in the first quarter from the previous year. The complaints, and widespread service outages during last month’s Northeast blackout, have led to calls for increased regulation of wireless carriers.
“The most generous thing I can say is that it’s OK,” Commissioner Carl Wood of the California PUC said of the trade group’s standards. The guidelines “are at best a statement of good intentions, and there is no enforcement behind it. This is not comparable to regulations.”
The association will allow carriers who comply with the guidelines to use a quality seal in their advertising, Kuo said. “This is a way to increase customer information and customer service without the costs and hassles that are tied to a lot of the state regulatory proposals.”
Carriers such as AT&T; Wireless Services Inc. and Nextel Communications Inc. already follow some of the voluntary guidelines, which include disclosing terms and fees in advertisements and allowing customers a trial period.
The proposed “telecommunications bill of rights” in California mandates a trial period of at least 30 days, late-payment penalties of no more than 1.5% a month of the overdue balance and obtaining customers’ written consent before giving personal information to a third party.
