TIO – Tricks of the trade

Dealing with the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (‘TIO’) can be a long and arduous task, but it doesn’t have to be.  With the right approach you can achieve successful outcomes.

As the telco industry well knows, customers will regularly contact the TIO hoping to use the system to their advantage, whether it be getting out of a fixed term contract, or trying to avoid paying excess charges. The biggest mistake Telcos and ISPs make with the TIO is not dealing with the complaint in a proper and systematic way.

In this two part series you will learn how to better deal with TIO complaints, and how you can achieve better outcomes. In this part 1, we are going to look at the basic questions in dealing with TIO complaints.

A TIO complaint should be approached with a couple of questions in mind:

1. Who is the complainant ?
2. What is the complaint ?

Who is the complainant ?

It sounds straight forward, but in many cases it is not clear.

In one recent case, an ISP received a TIO complaint made by Miguel Sanchez (not his real name) who was a Director of the XYZ Constructions., When the ISP checked its customer records it found that there was no account in that name, but rather in the name of XYZ Constructions Pty Ltd.

In this situation, the actual identuty of the complainant had a bearing on the ISP’s Consumer Protection Code obligations.  The customer was a sophisticated business with an annual telco spend of about $50,000.  If the complainant hadn’t been correctly identified, the TIO may have made an adverse finding against the ISP for failing to comply with the Consumer Protection Code.

What is the complaint ?

Again, simple I hear you say.  Well that’s not the case.

In many TIO complaints, the complainant or the TIO (and in many cases the telco or ISP themselves) either incorrectly identify the issues or are very unclear as to what the issues are. This is a point where telcos and ISPs can have an adverse finding against them, unless the issues in dispute are clearly identified and dealt with.

An analogy can be drawn between a charge the police lay and a complaint made against a CSP.  For instance, the police can charge someone with recklessly causing injury and or intentionally causing injury.  Although both charges relate to an injury being caused, the defence to these charges is different, one has a deliberate mental element and one doesn’t.

Like complaints made, unless you are clear about what the precise complaint is, you may end up failing to address the issue.

If you can ask these 2 basic questions from the outset you are well on your way to successfully dealing with a TIO complaint.

In Part 2 we will look at how to respond to TIO complaints.