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ACMA cracks whip on premium SMS

  • Services like Jamster will be affected
  • 19- services can mislead customers
  • Amaysim blocking 19- numbers by default
Written by Adam Wajnberg
01/03/2012

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), a government body charged with protecting telecommunications customers from poor practices, has cracked down on premium mobile services.

                      regulation

Premium SMS and MMS services includes ringtones, pictures, songs, horoscopes, dating services and much more. To access these services, the user sends a text message to a number starting with 19-, and continues to receive content on an almost daily basis. The customer is often unaware that they are being charged as much as $5 for each piece of content they receive. Unsubscribing from these services can sometimes be difficult, requiring calling a service centre with long wait times, or registering for a website and logging in to stop services. As new rules have been introduced over the years, Premium SMS providers have shifted their policies to keep a step ahead.

For over ten years, services such as Jamster (and Jamba! In the UK), Mobilegate, Winning Bid, and Jobspy have targeted teenagers with exciting ads on late night TV, early morning TV, and on popular pay television channels like Channel V, MTV and The Comedy Channel. Many mobile service providers have had to deal with angry parents with bills of several thousand dollars. Unfortunately, the mobile providers have no legal power to cancel the subscription services, or to refund the charges.

ACMA put in a new code in July 2009 that saw complaints fall 90 per cent from their peak. Their new code, to be active from June 1, 2012, will seek to make it even harder for premium mobile services to mislead customers. Prices and terms and conditions will be made even clearer, and mobile carriers offering 19- subscription services will be made to monitor and report regular trends to ACMA.

The new code has been developed by the Communications Alliance, an independent group that offers a free online tool for tracking and reporting misbehaving 19 subscription services at http://www.19sms.com.au/index.

Amaysim currently offers Unlimited plans from $40, which includes 1300 and 1800 numbers (an Australian first) and blocks 19 number by default. Call Amaysim on 1300 209 198.

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