Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, April 12) — Globe Telecom has called on telecommunications regulators to expand the list of acceptable official ID cards in registering SIMs to include company and school IDs as some Filipinos struggle to secure government-issued IDs.
During a briefing on Thursday, the firm explained that one of the deterrents for subscribers to register — especially prepaid subscribers and the youth — is their lack of access to a government ID.It reiterated that the failure to register SIM cards may result in subscribers’ loss of mobile services. Registration will run until April 26, but the Department of Information and Communications Technology can extend it by 120 more days.[The IDs,] hindi siya issued by the government pero ‘yong identification ‘yong habol natin,” Globe’s Chief Sustainability and Corporate Communications Officer Yoly Crisanto said in a media briefing on Thursday, referring to school and company identification.[Translation: The IDs are not issued by the government but what we are after is their identification.]The other thing is ‘yong tinatawag nating conditional registration, ‘yon bang pumasok ka doon sa sistema, magre-register ka, pero wala kang ma-upload na ID so ang tawag doon conditional — tanggapin natin ng tamang panahon para makapag-upload sila ng ID in that way hindi sila mawawalan ng services ng April 27,” she said. [Translation: The other thing is conditional registration where we will allow subscribers to register in the system without uploading an ID — we will give them time to upload an ID — in that way, they will not lose services by April 27.]While Globe has witnessed a 30% spike in the number of registrants, the company remains hopeful that the government would heed the industry’s call for an extension.“That’s why we continue to appeal to the government for an extension and to give our customers more options, for now, dahil mga may mga limitations,” Globe’s Vice President for Mobile Prepaid Business Eric Tanbauco said.[Translation: That’s why we continue to appeal to the government for an extension and to give our customers more options, for now, due to limitations.]Aside from Globe, PLDT’s wireless arm Smart Communications and DITO Telecommunity made a similar appeal.As of April 11, the National Telecommunications Commission reported that about 66 million SIMs of the more than 168 million have been registered.
