Reforms promote free and online homologation of cell phones

The Telecommunications Regulation and Control Agency (Arcotel) will begin public hearings on September 4 to receive observations and comments on the draft amendments to the Regulation for homologation and certification of telecommunications terminal equipment .

Reforms promote free and online homologation of cell phones

The reforms aim at the suppression of the fee for administrative procedures for homologation and certification of this equipment; hearings will take place at 10:00 am, using the Cisco Webex platform.

The homologation process determines whether a cell phone model can operate on mobile phone networks in the country without problems, an activity that is carried out for once. Until July 2020, Arcotel has approved a total of 26,956 models of cell phones, tablets, laptops and other devices , which operate without problems on Ecuador’s mobile networks.

The report indicates that more natural persons request the approval (technical verification), but desist from the process due to the barrier that the payment of the fee implies , which in certain cases could exceed the cost of the terminal equipment to be approved.

It also indicates that the implementation of information technologies optimizes management and that, if the fee is eliminated, the number of requests would increase, which will benefit the telecommunications sector, the country and users.

On September 2, the details of the opinions, recommendations and comments received will be made available to interested parties on the institutional website. Currently, Arcotel is developing a virtual platform for citizens to access the online approval process in the coming weeks , without the need for the applicant to be physically present.

The advantages of electronic processing include speed, security, quick location and easy document storage, transparency, automatic notifications, among other aspects.