New Delhi, July 10 (IANS). The Central Government on Friday issued a clarification on some media reports coming out regarding 1600 and 140 series phone numbers. The government said that these reports may spread misunderstanding among people and create confusion regarding the use of these numbers.
Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) issued a statement saying that 1600 series numbers are used only for making service and transaction related calls by regulated entities in the banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) sector.
According to TRAI, these numbers are used by entities under the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) and Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) to contact their existing customers. Apart from this, government institutions also use this series of numbers to provide important information to the citizens.
“The main objective of issuing 1600 series numbers is to ensure that such critical calls received by customers and citizens are reliable. Tagging, blocking or filtering of calls originating from 1600 series is not permitted under the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference Regulation (TCCCPR),” TRAI said.
At the same time, the use of 140 series numbers has been made mandatory for making promotional calls by companies and institutions of all sectors.
TRAI said that any entity that wants to make promotional calls from 140 series number will have to register with the concerned telecom service provider under TCCCPR and comply with the regulatory rules.
The telecom regulator also said that customers have the right to decide through the Do Not Disturb (DND) registry whether they want to receive promotional calls coming from the 140 series or not. If customers wish, they can block promotional calls from one, many or all regions.
According to TRAI, if a customer has blocked promotional calls from a particular region or all regions in the DND registry, he will not receive any calls from those regions from the 140 series.
Customers can register their DND preferences through multiple means. TRAI DND app can also be used for this.
TRAI clarified that calls coming from 140 series are also not allowed to be tagged or filtered. These can be blocked only as per DND registry. According to the regulator, tagging calls could lead to confusion among customers who have given permission to receive promotional calls from a particular region.
–IANS
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