Phone providers clueless over prepaid card registration

Anissa S. Febrina, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The issuance of a ministerial regulation requiring prepaid card cell phone subscribers to register with cellular providers is causing confusion among the companies.

Three major cellular providers -- PT Telkomsel, PT Indosat and PT Excelcomindo Pratama -- acknowledged that they were still assessing which measures would be feasible to implement and best suit the interests of their customers and card vendors.

Indosat -- the second largest telecommunications company here issuing prepaid card products of Mentari, Matrix and IM3 -- said it was discussing the issue with card dealers, on whom the company relies for distribution of its cards.

The firm's consumer market director Johnny Suwardi Sjam said on Tuesday that the distribution line for prepaid cards involved many layers and thus the company needed to assess many potential problems.

"What we can do now is to encourage existing prepaid subscribers to voluntarily register through our consumer loyalty program," he said.

Since Oct. 14 -- the day when the Ministry of Communications and Information's issued a ministerial regulation stipulating that all cellular phone providers must identify their prepaid card users nationwide -- Indosat has only been able to register 700,000 of its 12 million prepaid card users. The company is confused about the date to implement manual and computerized registration systems for new users.

The regulation requires cellular providers to compile names, addresses and birth dates for all customers, which is to be proven by copies of legal identification cards, passports, driver's licenses or student cards.

The largest cellular provider, Telkomsel, was also in the process of trying to decide how it would register all its customers with its distributors and for the time being relies on subscribers' voluntarily registrations.

At present, the firm has registered about 25 percent of its 22 million subscribers of its simPATI and Kartu AS prepaid cards.

Excelcomindo plans to register new prepaid card subscribers during the activation period and require dealers to collect copies of buyers' ID cards, said the firm's corporate communications manager V. Elisawati.

"We are currently collecting ideas and exercising several possible scenarios," she said. "In the case of current prepaid users, we might use our call center or rely on text messaging to get the data required."

Excelcomindo, with a 15.5 percent market share, says that 95 percent of its 6.3 million subscribers use prepaid products Jempol and Bebas.

Today, prepaid cards for cellular phones are still sold without the need for buyers to fill in a form or submit a copy of their ID card. Prepaid cards are offered starting at Rp 20,000 (US$2).

The regulation is meant to be a deterrent to scams and terrorism. The registration process must be completed by April 2006.

The compiled data of prepaid card buyers will be submitted by the operators to the Attorney General's Office, the National Police and the communications ministry.

In the long run, the minister's policy would be formulated as a ministerial decree to prevent the abuse of telecommunications services.