The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India has eased the process of Mobile Number Portability for switching from one telecom operator to another. TRAI has established new timelines for completion of MNP requests and the process which used to take 7 long days earlier will now take only 2 days for port requests within the same telecom circle. Requests to port out from one circle to another should now take 4 working days instead of 15. The timeline to complete porting requests for corporate mobile connections is also set for 4 days. These new timelines have nation-wide implications, except for Jammu & Kashmir, Assam and North East.
TRAI attributes the faster completion of MNP requests to a new system using which the Mobile Number Portability Service Provider scans for unique porting codes generated in the database of the Donor Operator on a real time basis. The MNSP then forwards the unique porting code to the telco which needs to onboard the new customer. Since this process is now automated, the time taken to complete number porting requests has been reduced to two days. TRAI has also decreased the validity of unique porting codes from 15 days to 4 days, except for in Jammu & Kashmir, Assam and North East.
Port requests can also be withdrawn easily now and all it takes is an SMS to do so.
Further, the TRAI has also defined penalties on telcos for not completing MNP requests in time. A penalty of as much as Rs 10,000 has been prescribed for each wrongful rejection of porting requests. Telcos could also be fined up to Rs 5,000 per contravention for not sharing a customer’s’ details with the MNSP in a 24-hour time frame after a MNP request has been initiated by the customer.