On 19th July, 2013 TRAI (Telecom Authority of India) clarifies the date of submission of CAFs (Consumer Application Forms) of the cable TV consumers of Kolkata including four other districts. In a meeting held at New Delhi, it sets the deadline as 23rd August, 2013 for the MSOs and the Cable TV operators. Failing to comply with the deadline may result in switching off cable service and breach of contract against the MSOs. Besides, by 31st August, 2013 all the cable operators need to offer digital service to their consumers through the new consumer package system.
The Kolkata Multi Service Operators or the MSOs submitted written applications in the past to extend the deadline till 9th of September 2013. Keeping in mind the requests and after having through discussions, TRAI finally rolls out the August deadline. If the CAFs are not duly submitted by the cable operators within the deadline then the subscriber may face cable disconnection.
In comparison to other states, the customer application forms submission procedure has been below 25 percent within Kolkata and its neighboring districts. According to TRAI, this stats is not at all a satisfactory progress because CAF is mandatory for all consumers. If all the subscriber details are not available soon it would be difficult for them to bring in a desirable control in the system. Since, in the old analogue system the customer information was unavailable the cable operators or the MSOs used to evade paying taxes to the government. To remove this anomaly, the customer management system gets digital whereby a subscriber need to fill the customer application form or CAF. Through the CAF a subscriber has to choose the package or channels according to his/her need.
One reason for the poor percentage of CAF submission in Kolkata is the late arrival and acceptance of the set-top boxes in the region. All the MSOs are sending the CAFs to the subscribers through the cable operators to speed up the process. They are also instructing the cable operators to run and transmit the package service as early as possible.
The DAS or the digital addressable cable TV system regulation of 2012 makes submission of CAF compulsory before the installation, activation and transmission of cable service.