Earlier this week, while talking to some executives of a local telco, I opened up the topic of prepaid SIM registration and asked why they’re not keen on implementing it on their own (without government mandate).
I told them that a recent poll on YugaTech readers, about 75% of over 2,000 respondents favor prepaid SIM registration.
Their answer was along the lines of logistical issues and and legal concerns (it’s basically the corporate lawyers telling everyone they can’t do some stuff that could open more legal problems in the future). I previously wrote about the pros and cons here as well.
So here was my suggestion:
1) Make registration voluntary. Only those who want to register will be initially included.
2) Integrate existing web services so deployment is fast and easy. Smart currently has my.Smart and Globe also has a Portal where people can register their mobile numbers.
3) Use this as verification of SIM ownership. So next time you lose, damage or accidentally blocked a SIM, you will only need to login to the website, de-activate the existing SIM, submit request for new one and even transfer the load credits, SMS and contact information (the last two need to be done as a web backup, prior to losing the SIM).
When claiming the new SIM in the business center, just present two valid IDs. No need for affidavit of loss and the SIM card tray.
That’s it. It’s a start, baby steps. No government involvement. We’ll worry about the other issues later.
It’s a win-win strategy — subscribers get added service and permanent ownership of a prepaid number while telcos can get to know more about the demographic profile of their subs.
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