TIO welcomes external review

By Ry Crozier on Mar 30, 2011 10:49 AM
Filed under Telco/ISP

Internal review also underway.

Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman Simon Cohen has welcomed an external review by the Department of Communications, announced earlier this month.

Cohen told iTnews that the external review was "about making sure the TIO had the right tools to do its job".

"I certainly welcome the review and welcome the opportunity to make sure - particularly as we move into a converged communications and media environment - we've got the right tools to do our job," he said.

He also welcomed an examination by the Department of the TIO's three-tier governance structure.

"I think it's good to have a review and to look at those matters closely," he said.

The external review came at a potentially challenging time for Cohen, as the TIO organisation was also part-way through an internal review process ordered by the TIO board.

Cohen declined to speculate on the outcomes of either review, given both were in progress.

New TIO website

Cohen also told iTnews that the TIO would relaunch its website as early as mid this year.

The new site would include some level of social media integration; last year, the department revealed plans to accept complaints via Twitter and Facebook.

"We're hoping to have a new website launch the middle of this year and we'll use that as a bit of a spearhead to try and sharpen our focus across all of the social media channels," Cohen said.

3 comments in this discussion

"@Anonymous, Sorry, I was not aware that the TIO was an intentionally-knobbled industry offering. I had assumed it was simply a well-intended but toothless offering from the government. Yes, a ..."

By Graeme Harrison (prof at-symbol post.harvard.edu)

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Comments: 3

Graeme Harrison (prof at-symbol post.harvard.edu) Mar 30, 2011 3:24 PM	The biggest single efficiency gain (and public benefit) that the TIO could achieve is to get away from dealing ONLY on a case-by-case basis. Most of the big stuff-ups and bill-shock situations are: 1. Overseas data rates. If data packs are regularly sold in Australia for $10/GB, then charging $50,000/GB is unconscionable. The TIO can't directly affect what foreign telcos charge, but it COULD determine that anything above $200/GB was unconscionable to charge foreigners whilst in Australia. Then just sit back and watch that Aussie telcos would FORCE their foreign counterparts to charge equivalent rates for Aussies travelling in their territories. The TIO might also determine that it is unconscionable for an Aussie telco to 'make' (ie as its share of the margin) more than $100/GB, as fee splits on $50,000/GB are hugely profitable for Aussie telcos, whilst they tell customers that such bills are from the foreign telco in the country where they travelled, so the Aussie telco can do little about it. 2. Most Applicable Plan. The TIO could determine that it was unconscionable for any telco to charge more than 130% of the amount it would have charged, had its client been on the most appropriate plan (determined in hindsight for any given billing month). This would get rid of the 'trip-wire' effects of having pricing in units that consumers don't understand (MB/month) and high-margin incremental billing above purported 'caps'. 3. Required Notification. The TIO could set out a required (for contract law) notification to be sent to clients (by SMS and email to the client's pre-existing, not ISP-supplied email address) notifying the client of each major increment of any additional spend being incurred. 4. Adequate Level of Service. The TIO could determine the level of drop-outs, non-coverage in claimed areas of coverage, and other levels of unsatisfactory service which give rise to a client being able to claim that a contract is terminated by reason of the telco's failure to deliver a reliable service, or a reduction in pricing that should apply while the poor service continues. That would really give telcos some incentive to fix their on-going network problems, or over-claims as to coverage. Now, if the TIO did such things (even though it does not have any statutory authority to explicitly modify contracts in existence between telcos and their clients), the de facto contractual basis would be modified. If a consumer went to court, with the relevant authority having determined that such-and-such was 'unconscionable conduct' the judge would undoubtedly back up the TIO. That is how it works, and in practice, these types of regulators do not need the statutory authority they claim they need to modify things... they only have to offer opinions, and that becomes de facto industry standard.
anonymous Mar 30, 2011 6:58 PM	There may be a bit more to it than that, Graeme. You may be overlooking the fact that the TIO is an industry ADR scheme, and it seems that every member of the TIO board is appointed by industry. This suggests that there may be some serious systemic structural problems in the organisation, as well as the specific points you have rightly raised. Your final paragraph pointing out that the TIO 'does not have any statutory authority' is probably the clincher. Perhaps the TIO should be taken over by the federal govt so that it was independent of industry and had the statutory backing you mention.
Graeme Harrison (prof at-symbol post.harvard.edu) Apr 4, 2011 12:08 PM	@Anonymous, Sorry, I was not aware that the TIO was an intentionally-knobbled industry offering. I had assumed it was simply a well-intended but toothless offering from the government. Yes, a prerequisite for my suggestions is that the regulator is independent of the industry players. In all these schemes, the industry prefers to have a solution which is limited to a case-by-case assistance, without setting any overall service delivery expectations... or across-the-board remediation steps. Only an independent regulator will ever seek to fix root cause issues. Industry-nominated solutions tend to be window-dressing.