Camarines Sur Rep. Migz Villafuerte is hoping for the judicious congressional action on a pro-consumer measure allowing prepaid and postpaid subscribers of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to still use or carry over their remaining or unused data to the next billing cycle or until such loads are fully consumed.
“We in the House committee on information and communications technology (ICT) are hoping for the judicious action by the Congress on a bill requiring all ISPs to adopt a roll-over data allocation system lifting the expiration periods on loads,” Villafuerte said.
“This is to allow both the prepaid and postpaid subscribers of ISPs to carry over or still use their remaining or unused data to the next billing cycle or until their loads are fully consumed,” added Villafuerte, who chairs the House committee on information and communications technology (ICT).
Villafuerte’s ICT committee approved during its first meeting before the recent congressional recess the consolidated bill called the “Roll-Over Data Act.”
He said the chamber’s ICT panel unanimously approved two months ago Committee Report (CR) No. 9 on House Bill (HB) No. 87, in consolidation with HB 650 and HB 708.
“This means goodbye to the currently unfair, anti-consumer practice of ISPs to have their subscribers, whether with prepaid or postpaid data packages, forfeit their unused data when their particular subscriptions end.”
HB 87 was introduced by Reps. Ramon Jolo Revilla III, Lani Mercado-Revilla, Bryan Revilla, Noel Rivera and Javier Miguel Benitez; HB 650 was introduced by Reps. Tobias Tiangco and Rivera; and HB 708 was introduced by Rep. Benitez.
Villafuerte explained that CR 9, which had consolidated the three bills that similarly seek to end the data or load caps enforced by ISPs on their subscribers, “was unanimously approved, subject to style, during the organizational meeting of the ICT panel.”
“As approved by our ICT committee, once this bill becomes a law, both the prepaid and postpaid subscribers of all ISPs will be able to use the remaining data or loads of their mobile data packages even after such expire in one or several days or in a month, depending on their respective subscription plans,” Villafuerte said.
“This means goodbye to the currently unfair, anti-consumer practice of ISPs to have their subscribers, whether with prepaid or postpaid data packages, forfeit their unused data when their particular subscriptions end after a day, three days, a week, 15 days or one month,” he added.
As moved by Camsur Rep. Tsuyoshi Anthony Horibata and seconded by Northern Samar Rep. Niko Raul Daza, the ICT panel, during that meeting, had approved HB No. 87 in consolidation with HB 650 and HB 708.
A similar bill requiring ISPs to adopt a roll-over data scheme was passed by the House of Representatives in the 18th Congress after the measure was refined by a technical working group (TWG) co-chaired by Negros Occidental Rep. Francisco Benitez and then-Cavite Rep. and now Bacoor Mayor Strike Revilla.
However, the Senate was not able to act on a counterpart bill.
The consolidated bill makes it a State policy “to implement measures regulating Internet services provided by ISPs with the goal of ensuring that the interest and welfare of consumers are protected and upheld,” Villafuerte said.
Villafuerte said this committee-passed consolidated bill seeks to guarantee that Internet service end-users or subscribers are able to enjoy the full value of the data allocation that they pay for.
The bill also aims to assure consumers that their unused data allotments shall not be lost, and shall rather be carried over to succeeding months, and can be converted by yearend into rebates that they may also avail of and use.
Villafuerte’s ICT committee approved during its first meeting before the recent congressional recess the consolidated bill called the “Roll-Over Data Act.”
“Data Capping” refers in the bill to the limit of bandwidth allocations that ISPs offering to their respective subscribers for a given period.
ISPs refer, meanwhile, to service-based operators whose services involve the combination of computer processing, information storage, protocol conversion and transmission to give their subscribers access to Internet content and services plus multimedia services through digital subscriber line (DSL), fixed wireless broadband, cable broadband, fiber-optic or fiber-to-the-home (FITH) and mobile data.
“Roll-Over Data Allocation” refers to the unused internet data allocation per day, week, or month, as the case may be, depending on the applicable Internet Data Packages of ISP subscribers that shall be carried over to the following day, week, or month until the data are fully consumed.
Villafuerte said that for postpaid subscribers or users, the rolled-over data allocation shall be prioritized to be consumed in the preceding month, provided, that the unused data every month shall be rolled-over and accumulated up until the last month of the year.
All unused data allocation for a year may be used and converted as rebates, which may be used by subscribers as payment for their respective Internet services in the succeeding year of subscription.
As for prepaid subscribers or users and postpaid subscribers who avail of internet data package promo offers, their unused data allocations shall be rolled-over, provided that the subscribers or users renew their subscriptions right after the lapse of the duration of their respective data packages.
The unused data allocation of subscribers who fail to renew their subscriptions on time shall be reduced by 20% every day until the subscriptions are renewed.
If the subscriptions are not renewed after 5 days, all unused data allocations shall be considered consumed.
The only exemptions for these data caps are the subscribers who have availed and shall avail of any unlimited internet data package with no data caps.
Any ISP who fails to comply with any of the provisions of this Act shall be fined P50,000 per violation; and for repeat offenders, the penalty, aside from the cash fines, are the revocation or cancellation of the license, registration or franchise of an ISP including the waiving of any pre-termination fees of affected subscriber.
On top of the cash penalty, repeat violators face the revocation or cancellation of their licenses, registration or franchises, and the waiving of any pre-termination fees of the affected subscribers.
