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By Thea Alberto, INQUIRER.net
November 24, 2008
MANILA, Philippines -- A group of cellular phone load dealers have asked the help of Congress to intervene in a telecommunication firm's supposed plan to lay them off to shorten the chain of operations.
Consumer group TXTPower, along with Telco Entrepreneurs Association (TEA), claimed that Smart Communications Inc. was planning to dismiss thousands of electronic load dealers nationwide effective at the end of the month.
Both the National Telecommunications Commission and the Department of Trade and Industry have told Smart electronic load [e-load] dealers that they do not have jurisdiction over their predicament, and so Congress must step in to fill the void, rescue these dealers from certain bankruptcy, and exercise their oversight functions on the franchises granted to Smart Communications and parent company PLDT [Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co.], said TXTPower president Anthony Ian Cruz.
TEA President Robert Galo said Smart was planning to reformat its operations, which would mean removing the dealers or the "middlemen" in the chain of operations. Roughly 50,000 dealers, including retailers who sell e-load in small stores nationwide, will be affected, Galo said.
Cruz said that Smart should recognize the role of the e-load dealers "who have formed the company."
Galo lamented Smart officials have yet to talk to them and has been refusing their calls for a dialogue.
Smart introduced its e-load system in 2002 and asked entrepreneurs to become dealers. These dealers then recruited retailers who would sell e-load to end-users. The set-up has resulted in the widening of Smart’s reach nationwide.
But Smart public affairs head Mon Isberto said in a separate interview that the new scheme would be "more orderly" and would not affect the consumers.
"We just want it to be more orderly and more transparent, it's better that way," Isberto told INQUIRER.net over the phone.
Isberto said the new scheme, to entail legitimate regional and provincial distributors, would directly sell electronic load to retailers, which would have direct contact to the consumers. The distributors must be exclusive to Smart.
"The reorganization does not affect retailers at all and therefore our ability to serve subscribers is not affected," said Isberto.
Isberto also belied the TEA's claims they have been evading dialogues, saying they have been trying to communicate with the dealers but were having a hard time because the dealers in the current scheme were not officially listed in a database.
"We don't know who the sub-dealers are; what we've been doing since September is trying to communicate with them to register," said Isberto.
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