The Commerce Commission has published a list of telecommunications providers who are and are not members of the Telecommunications Dispute Resolution Scheme (TDRS). The TDRS was created over ten years ago to resolve issues between providers and consumers, but unlike schemes in other sectors, it requires voluntary membership from businesses. The Commerce Commission has said that non-members such as Contact Energy, InspireNet, Lightwire and Voyager leave over 100,000 consumers locked out of free dispute resolution.
“We don’t want consumers to find that they’re locked out of the scheme when they need it the most - when they run into a problem they can’t resolve with their telecommunications provider. The Commission has encouraged all telecommunications providers to sign up to ensure customers have equal recourse when it comes to disputes and that industry participants are on a level playing field,” said Tristan Gilbertson, Telecommunications Commissioner.
The published list showed that most larger providers, with revenues of over $10 million annually, are members. Contact Energy is the largest company that is not a member of the TDRS and has 70,000 customers.
“Customers need to know when they are being sold services by providers who won’t give them access to the industry dispute resolution scheme when things go wrong - as well as providers who will - and that's exactly what the list we’re publishing today is designed to show.”
