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Last Updated: Feb 6, 2017 - 2:32:04 PM |
URCA TALK – Minister for Grand Bahama the Hon. Dr. Michael Darville along with Mrs. Kathleen Smith as they stress the need for consumers to comment on the proposed Consumer Protection Regulation. (BIS Photo / Vandyke Hepburn)
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FREEPORT, Bahamas – Minister for Grand Bahama, the Hon., Dr. Michael Darville on Monday, July 15, urged residents to take advantage of the ongoing public consultations regarding the newly purposed Consumer Protection Regulation.
Dr. Darville and Mrs. Kathleen Smith, Chief Executive officer for Utilities Regulation and Competition Authority (URCA) held a press conference at the Ministry for Grand Bahama situated in the Harold DeGregory Complex.
The Minister voiced that his Ministry is partnering with URCA in that exercise and encouraged all Grand Bahama residents and Bahamians everywhere to come forward with their comments and ideas.
He explained that URCA is responsible for regulation of electronic communication throughout the country including Grand Bahama and that URCA is essentially the watchdog of telecommunications including radio, television broadcast and spectrum management.
“The need for consumer regulation in the electronic communication sector is necessary to ensure that the general public receives quality service from all providers.
“Over the past few months URCA has been in direct contact with the general public throughout the country concerning the new consumer protection regulation and I am pleased to announce that the first of the Consumer Protection Regulations is ready for review and copies are available at the Ministry for Grand Bahama,” he stated.
Dr. Darville stressed that it is important that the general public know that they are looking for further comments to the proposed regulation and that residents have until the end of August to do so.
“Grand Bahama must understand that these regulations is about you the consumer and the ongoing need for URCA to ensure that quality service is available, and is mandatory in the sector,” he said.
Touching on the consultation process, Mrs. Smith explained that some Bahamians may ask the question, how does that impact me at all or why should I be interested?
She noted that “when URCA was consulted last year on the price increase for Cable Bahamas as well and the BTC outage on the mobile sector last year June, as well as some of the complaints that we have been receiving, we realise that quality of service was a significant issue in the country and therefore to ensure that we protect consumers we have drafted these set of Consumer Protection Regulations.
“Now how does this affect you as a consumer? Well, we have heard about late fees, reconnection fees. Should you be charged a late fee? Should you be charged a reconnection fee? How much should it be? What is considered reasonable? Those are some of the issues that URCA is driving at and trying to address in this public consultation document,” she explained.
Mrs. Smith also mentioned concerns regarding security deposits, advertising, understanding contracts and bills, time frame for activation of service and more.
She encouraged all to have a look at the proposed document “because it does impact you. It does impact how you receive your radio communications, your television broadcast, your cellular service, your fix line service, your internet service. So it impacts each and every one of us in some way shape or form,” she said.
Mrs. Smith also confirmed that they have extended the consultative process “because we realise that it is a very important issue, so instead of closing on August 2nd we will now close on August 30th 2013. So that will give everyone a little more time to actually have a read of the document and to follow up and provide comments.”
The full document is on the URCA website which is www.urcabahamas.bs or persons can call the toll free line which is 1-242-3000 URCA.
© Copyright 2013 by thebahamasweekly.com
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