BTRC may scrap call centre permits

Over 250 call-centre licensees may lose their permits as they failed to start operations within six months into the receipt of licences at only Tk 5,000 each. According to officials at the Bangladesh Telecommunication regulatory Commission (BTRC), most of the licensees have failed to start operations within the stipulated time, which is a breach of contract with the commission. “If they fail to show us that they have the interest or capability to operate call centres, their licences may be scrapped,” said a top BTRC official, seeking anonymity.

From October 2008 to March 2009, the deadline expired for around 200 licensees, while another 50 or more will face the same within the next month, officials said.

They said the BTRC gave call centre licences to 251 applicants. Of these, 69 were provided with hosted call centre licences, while 53 got hosted call centre service provider licences.

However, only around 29 of the licensees have reportedly managed to establish their operations since the commission started dishing out call centre licences in April last year at an exiguous fee.

The call centre licence guidelines specify that a licensee would have to start operations within six months after getting the licence.

“The licensee shall commence operation within 6 months from issuance of the licence. Extension may be considered upon the receipt of any application from the licensee stating reasons thereof, otherwise it may be cancelled,” the guideline says.

The BTRC officials said they have served notices to the call centre licensees to report their current status of activities to the commission. However many of the licensees could not be contacted due to ‘confusion’ over their contact information provided to the BTRC.

In the latest attempt, the telecom watchdog recently published a notice in newspapers asking organisations that are uninterested or incapable of running call centres to surrender their licences to the commission by May 16.

A grace period of one month has been given to the errant licensees to surrender their licences voluntarily, otherwise their licences will be revoked.

“After the grace period is over, a meeting will be convened to decide the future of the inoperative licensees. Some might be given additional time to start operations under special circumstances. Others may lose licences,” said a BTRC official.

The move has generated mixed reactions from different call centre licensees.

“Call centre is perhaps one of the most difficult business to start and manage. It takes time, a lot of resources and a bit of luck to successfully start a [call centre] business,” said Mahmud Hossain at AN Telecom, a licensee whose deadline has already expired.

Robin Ahsan, a superviser at Mexcall, a call centre operator and training institute in Gulshan, has other views.

“Most of the people have no idea about call centre. They do not have the
experiences or resources to start or operate a call centre,” he said. “So if you cannot contribute to the industry, just leave it.”

Industry experts said Bangladesh might be one of the biggest beneficiaries of the mass transfer of call centre jobs from Europe and North America thanks to its convenient time zone and cheap labour.

“However the industry would not go anywhere with a bunch of people with little knowledge about call centres only flashing their licenses around,” said
a BTRC official.

“Most of the licensees do not even know what a call centre is. They do not have resources and expertise to run a call centre,” he said.

Allegedly the BTRC was so ‘generous’ with the licences that even owners of phone service centres and cybercafé are now the proud licensees in exchange of a fee of Tk 5,000.

However BTRC has decided to make the licence acquisition rules more stringent.

Source: The Daily Star