How TRAI Channel Selector App Helps Pay TV Users Create The Best Bouquet

A new app by India’s telecom regulator allows television channel subscribers to efficiently customise packs as TRAI continues its effort to help users pay only for what they want to watch, and not for what operators bundle together.

TRAI Channel Selector, launched on June 25 by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, is available for download on the Google Play Store and Apple Store. The app is in response to the difficulty being faced by subscribers in opting for channels of their choice on web portals or apps of distributed platform operators—industry parlance for direct-to-home operators and cable service providers.

The regulator’s new tariff order of 2019 gave consumers the freedom to make their own channel selections in a bouquet. It was aimed at ending the practice of pre-fixed bouquets sold by cable and DTH operators, forcing users to pay for more channels than they wanted.

Here’s How It Works

Cable operators and DTH players share application program interface, or the set of protocols and tools to build apps, with the regulator, allowing TRAI Channel Selector app to fetch data for subscribers.

BloombergQuint tested the app with a Tata Sky subscriber account. The app is available for free download on app stores. Here’s how it works:

Step 1

Once downloaded, a drop-down gives the list of service providers. DTH players connected with the app include Tata Sky, Airtel, Dish TV, D2H. Sun Direct is yet to integrate its system with the app.

Among the major multi-system operators, Asianet, Hathway Digital, InDigital, Siti Networks have integrated with the app.

Step 2

When a service provider is selected, in this case Tata Sky, a log-in page pops up, prompting users to punch in the registered mobile number or subscriber number or the set-box number. This is a two-factor authentication.

After adding subscriber details, the user gets a one-time password to log into the subscription page. This lists the summary including set-top box details, total number of channels, monthly pricing, bouquets selected, a-la-carte channels and free-to-air channels.

Step 3

The ‘View My Plan’ option on this page allows customers add or remove channels based on their preference.

The Optimiser

The app tried to offers the best value to consumers. Once a customer selects the pay channels of her choice, the app optimises the bouquet to include other channels that can be accommodated within that cost.

• For example, if a user builds a regional pay channel bouquet—consisting of say Malayalam channels. The optimiser will select free-to-air Malayalam channels or the bouquet that includes the selected pay channels in the same language within the same costs.
• If a customer selects English News pay channels, the optimiser will add free-to-air channels in that category.

Effectively, it tries to maximise the number of channels that a customer can access at the same or reduced costs. The final selection is updated with the service provider.