HomeArticlesUncategorizedNew other service providers guidelines for the BPO sector

New other service providers guidelines for the BPO sector

  • November 6, 2020
  • Posted by: indiozconsultants
  • Category: Uncategorized
No Comments

As a matter of great relief to the BPO sector, the Ministry of Communications, Government of India on 05 November 2020, issuedtheNew Guidelines for Other Service Providers (‘OSP’), overhauling the entire OSP regime.

To begin with, the cumbersome registration process for running an OSP Centre in India has been done away with. Now, an OSP Centre can beoperated without a registration. Besides, a number of other obligations, includingsubmission of exorbitant Bank Guarantees, which acted as an impediment to the growth of the sector, have also been done away with.

The OSP framework was put in place to safeguard security interests, apart from ensuring that the jurisdiction of the Telecom Service Providers is not infringed.The major features of the New Guidelines for Other Service Providers (‘New OSP Guidelines’) are discussed below:

  1. Definition of OSP: The scope of an entity providing OSP services has been expanded to include an LLP (‘Limited Liability Partnership’) under the LLP Act, 2008, a partnership firm an organization registered under the Shops & Establishments Act or any Legal Person.The definition of OSP has also been simplified to includeprovision of only voice-based Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) services.
  2. General Guidelines for OSP:
    1. As stated aforesaid, there is no registration certificate required for providing OSP services in India.
    2. The New OSP Guidelines permit collection, conversion, carriage and exchange of the PSTN/PLMN/ISDN traffic over the Virtual Private network (NPLC, MPLS VPN) interconnecting the different OSP Centres.
    3. The International OSPs are allowed to carry the aggregated switched voice traffic from their Points of Presence (‘POP’) in a foreign country to their OSP Centre in India over leased line/MPLS VPN.
    4. An OSP having multiple centres may obtain internet connection at a centralized location and this internet can be accessed from other OSP Centres using the leased circuits/ MPLS VPN.
    5. No Bank Guarantee shall have to be submitted for any facility or dispensation under the New OSP Guidelines.
    6. The New OSP Guidelines permit Infrastructure Sharing and Centralized EPABX (i.e. Distributed Architecture of EPABX).
    7. In view of the changes brought about by the COVID – 19 pandemic, the New OSP Guidelines now permit Work From Home (‘WFH’), Work From Anywhere (‘WFA’) in India.
    8. EPABX at a foreign location in case of an International OSP is permitted.
  3. Guidelines for sharing infrastructure, use of distributed architecture of EPABX and use of CUG:
    1. Sharing of infrastructure by the Domestic OSP and International OSP is permitted without any prior approval.
    2. Use of distributed architecture is permitted for OSP centres across India, where EPABX is owned by OSP.
    3. Use of CUG is permitted for internal communications and for its operations.
  4. Work From Home/ Work From Anywhere:
    1. A major relief from the earlier OSP regime has been the permission for WFH or WFA in India. No Bank Guarantee is required to be submitted for availing WFH or WFA in India facility.
    2. The facility of WFH (treated as an Extended Agent) or WFA in India (treated as Remote Agent Position) is permitted with the facility of interconnection.
    3. However, the OSP shall be responsible for any violation related to toll‑bypass.
  5. Security Conditions:
    1. Under the New OSP Guidelines, the OSP is no longer obligated to take measures to prevent objectionable, obscene, unauthorized or any other content, messages or communications infringing copyright, intellectual property, etc. However, the obligation to immediately prevent the carriage of such information stated aforesaid still exists on the OSP.
    2. The OSP is also under an obligation to extend support to the Authority in tracing any nuisance, obnoxious communications transported through its equipment and network.
    3. The New OSP Guidelines provide that the location of EPABX and client’s Data Centre of Domestic OSP is within India.
    4. In view of WFH and WFA in India facility, the requirement for preservation of Call Data Records (‘CDR’) for all the voice traffic carried using the EPABX is explained. The New OSP Guidelines states that the CDRs shall be segregated for each media gateway. It shall be possible to view CDR data along with details of the agent manning the position by remote login to CDR machine/ server. The time-stamp in CDRs in the system(s) of the OSP shall be synchronized with the Indian Standard Time.
    5. All records such as CDRs/ User Data Records/ System logs, etc. shall be maintained for a period of one year.
    6. For WFH or WFA in India, the OSP shall ensure that the system logs are tamper-proof and the CDRs/ all logs of the activities carried out by the Extended Agent shall be maintained for one year.

The relaxation in the OSP framework appears to be a welcome move by the Government. It now remains to be seen whether the new OSP regime will attract investments in the sector.