The Malta Communications Authority (MCA) has launched a consultation about the provision of itemised billing for mobile phone use.

The authority said itemised bills are a tool that allows subscribers to verify and control charges incurred and to adequately monitor their usage and expenditure.  The increase in the use of mobile telephony services, as well as the introduction of new services such as mobile data, has resulted in significantly more complex itemised bills.

The steep rise in the use of mobile phones over the past years has contributed to the increasingly large volumes of information being provided in itemised bills. The MCA’s last decision on itemised billing goes back to 2004.

While the MCA considers that such detailed bills could be required by subscribers in some instances, it is of the opinion that the provision of a more basic level of itemised bill could better assist end-users to monitor their usage and expenditure on a regular basis.

The authority is proposing that the provision of these detailed itemised bills in electronic format should remain free of charge and that a user would be able to retrieve them for at least a year. Any charges applied for the provision in hard copy format to both prepaid and post-paid subscribers should be reasonable and justified. Disabled subscribers and elderly subscribers would have the right to request a copy, either in electronic (if provided by the company) or in hard-copy format, free of charge.

The MCA is inviting all stakeholders to take part in the consultation so that it will be in a position to issue a decision notice as soon as possible. Responses to this consultation must be received by 5pm on Friday, July 5.