A consultation process on Premium Rate Services in the ‘5’ numbering range has been embarked upon by the Malta Communications Authority.

These services are accessible to subscribers of electronic communications through a telephone number starting with the digit ‘5’.

The charge for a premium telephone call or a premium text message is generally higher than that of a regular number.

Premium rate services are widely used in television competitions, televoting, fund raising and to access premium services in which subscribers call specific numbers to either participate in a programme, give a financial donation, or obtain other services by means of a telephone call or SMS.

One of the principle objectives of this document is to maximise consumer protection whilst encouraging competition in premium rate services to the benefit of the public, telephone service providers and the premium rate service providers.

The lack of a formal framework for premium rate services is currently leaving a negative effect, especially since these are only being made accessible from a number of operators.

In a document highlighting its proposed decision, the MCA highlights the importance of interconnection between operators to enable telephony subscribers access all premium rate services.

It is proposing a new retail mechanism which separates the advertised premium rate and the conveyance element, which should be equal to the charge normally paid for calls and SMSs.

It also makes proposals for the segmentation and treatment of different types of premium rate services; and specialised numbering arrangements for tariff transparency reasons.

This proposed decision is open for comments until July 31 and may be downloaded.

http://www.mca.org.mt/newsroom/openarticle.asp?id=881