Regulator will now fine telcos N5 million for unwanted text messages

We all rejoiced for a bit last year when the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC) directed all telcos in the country to set up a Do Not Disturb (DND) service for subscribers who didn't want to receive unsolicited text messages (basically all of us).

Subscribers only had to send "STOP" to 2442 and the unsolicited messages will stop coming in every five minutes.

Unsurprisingly, celebrations were shortlived as that did not happen. Telcos saw it as an opportunity to throw third-party value added service (VAS) providers under the bus and continued to send their own promos.

Now, after we have all sort of moved on, the NCC has decided to enforce the rule it put in place in July 2016.

Prof. Umar Danbatta, Executive Vice Chairman of the NCC, has said that telcos will now face a N5 million fine if a customer complains about those forever annoying text messages.

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“We are at the stage of imposing the Do Not Disturb (DND), code direction, meaning that any breach of this direction will attract a fine of ₦5 million. If a consumer lodges complaint to NCC that an MNO sends unsolicited text messages and the complaint from the consumer get to us, we will ensure that credit deducted from the consumers for this unsolicited text messages is returned to the consumer and will also invoke a provision of the fine on the MNO which is N5 million," he said, according to a Techpoint report.

"This is to ensure total compliance and this is a measure of last resort. The NCC impose regulation as a measure of last resort after we have given the MNO time to ensure compliance and we have monitored them to ensure compliance to ensure that the compliance is not selective.”

Whether this will actually stop the telcos from sending those pesky messages or the NCC is just making a lot of noise is another matter entirely. We'll just have to wait and see.