{"id":50935,"date":"2012-05-24T17:47:18","date_gmt":"2012-05-24T15:47:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=50935"},"modified":"2012-05-25T10:17:39","modified_gmt":"2012-05-25T08:17:39","slug":"data-rollover-notices-may-be-illegal-ispa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/broadband\/50935-data-rollover-notices-may-be-illegal-ispa.html","title":{"rendered":"Data rollover notices may be illegal: ISPA"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Internet Service Providers\u2019 Association (ISPA)<\/a> has welcomed a recent ruling by the National Consumer Tribunal which cancelled a compliance notice served on MultiChoice<\/a> by the National Consumer Commission (NCC) under the Consumer Protection Act<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ruling by the National Consumer Tribunal demonstrates that proper compliance with the Act is being enforced,\u201d said Jaap Scholten<\/a> ISPA co-chairperson. \u201cISPA commends the Tribunal for its rulings, and urges the Internet service provider industry to take note.\u201d<\/p>\n

ISPA said that in this case, the NCC served a compliance notice for various alleged infringements of the Act on MultiChoice, an entity licenced and governed by the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

According to ISPA, section 100(2) of the Act states that the Commission must consult with ICASA before serving a compliance notice on an entity regulated by ICASA.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Tribunal found that the Commission did not properly consult with ICASA before it issued the compliance notice and therefore ruled the compliance notices invalid,\u201d ISPA said.<\/p>\n

The Tribunal further ruled that the Commission had not fulfilled the requirements of section 100(2) in that it did not consult with ICASA about the specific company alleged to be in non-compliance with the CPA and did not provide information about these alleged contraventions.<\/p>\n

They also did not provide ICASA with the outcome of the investigation it had conducted about the alleged non-compliance.<\/p>\n

\"Jaap

Jaap Scholten<\/p><\/div>\n

Data rollover notices issued to ICASA-licensed ISPs<\/h3>\n

\u201cThe Act places considerable onus on the Commission in this section, and I wonder whether most of the compliance notices already served actually met this standard,\u201d Scholten said. \u201cIt\u2019s particularly important because of the compliance notices issued to ISPs relating to the Commission\u2019s application of Section 63 of the CPA.\u201d<\/p>\n

The issue revolves around the Commission\u2019s apparent desire to apply Section 63 to the payment in advance for data and other electronic services. Section 63 of the CPA refers specifically to transactions in which some form of actual prepayment device (\u201cprepaid certificate, card, credit, voucher or similar device\u201d) is issued by the supplier.<\/p>\n

ISPA contends that payment in advance for bandwidth does not fall under Section 63 because there is no prepayment device which \u201cholds\u201d the value to be exchanged for services in the future.<\/p>\n

The association said that it is rather a simple payment in advance for future access to services, which is specifically excluded by section 63(1).<\/p>\n

If applied to data and electronic services, Section 63 would force providers to allow customers to roll over unused bandwidth until it is used up, or three years have passed.<\/p>\n

ISPA advises that this would materially change the business model of ISPs and cause prices to be driven upwards.<\/p>\n

\u201cClearly, ADSL services that are uncapped would not be affected if Section 63 were to be applied to data services,” said Scholten.<\/p>\n

“What concerns is the application of Section 63 to contracts where the consumer buys the option to consume \u2018up to\u2019 a fixed amount of bandwidth per month,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

In this case, Scholten argued, the business model for the Internet service provider would have to change quite considerably, with the net effect of driving up prices.<\/p>\n

Scholten went on to say that it would also become impossible for Internet service providers to manage their networks effectively.<\/p>\n

\u201cInternet service providers manage the capacity of their networks based on the anticipated amount of bandwidth usage in a particular month, sourcing capacity from upstream providers based on this forecast,\u201d ISPA said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf data starts to roll over every month, Internet service providers will have no idea how much bandwidth would roll-over at the end of the month and would have to purchase extra capacity for possible roll-overs.\u201d<\/p>\n

ISPA said it would also be difficult for them to manage their networks to avoid congestion and deliver acceptable performance.<\/p>\n

Scholten said that ISPA urges the Commission to apply the law in the manner it was intended and not to strain its interpretation in a manner that would ultimately be to the consumer\u2019s disadvantage.<\/p>\n

ISPA advised its members who are served with a compliance notice in terms of the CPA first to ascertain whether the National Consumer Commission has properly consulted with ICASA.<\/p>\n

Related articles<\/h3>\n

Data rollover and the CPA<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

No data rollover lands broadband providers in trouble<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Should your broadband data expire?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Daylight robbery from cellular companies: IFP<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ISPA welcomed a recent ruling by the National Consumer Tribunal against the National Consumer Commission<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":25475,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[283,285,7437,35,533,2136,5602,459,11975,1203,11971,3408],"class_list":["post-50935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-broadband","tag-consumer-protection-act","tag-cpa","tag-data-rollover","tag-headline","tag-icasa","tag-independent-communications-authority-of-south-africa","tag-internet-service-providers-association","tag-ispa","tag-jaap-scholten","tag-national-consumer-commission","tag-national-consumer-tribunal","tag-ncc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50935"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50935"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50935\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50939,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50935\/revisions\/50939"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}