NEW DELHI: To address the issue of mobile call drops faced by telecom consumers in the country, the government has launched an Integrated Voice Response System (IVRS) system at multiple locations to obtain direct feedback from subscribers on call quality.
The IVRS system has been launched in Delhi, Mumbai, Punjab, UP, Uttarakhand, Maharashtra and Goa to obtain direct feedback from subscribers and use that feedback to solve the problem of call drop. The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) said the IVRS system would be extended to the entire country very soon.
Besides, DoT has taken a slew of initiatives to address the issue of call drops on mobile networks. Telecom operators have installed more than 1,30,000 additional Base Transceiver Stations or BTSs across the country between June 2016 and October 2016 and further plans to install more than 1,50,000 additional BTSs across the country by March 2017.
Commenting on the initiative, Communications Minister Manoj Sinha said that the platform is a channel to capture direct feedback from the consumers and this voice of the customer can be used to improve services that are being offered to them.
The IVRS system will be initially used for call drops and subsequently on its uses will be extended to capture consumer feedback in other areas.
Under the newly launched system, the users will receive an IVRS call from the shortcode 1955.
They will be asked a few questions about call drops such as Are they facing call drops in their area or not? The consumers can also send a toll-free SMS to the same short code 1955, containing the location of city/town/village, where they might be facing the problem of frequent call drops, it added.
As per a letter by DoT to operators in last week of November, the ‘1955’ number “is for the outbound calls to the subscribers, the IVRS system will have to present a predefined CLI (caller line identification) to the subscribers, through short code ‘1955’.”
Earlier, Sinha also warned operators that his ministry will not hesitate on slapping penalty and other actions in case consumers continue to face the menace of call drops and call failures.