CTIA Establishes Industry Standard for Grading Pre-Owned Wireless Devices

WASHINGTON – CTIA, the wireless industry association, today announced a common industry-wide standard for evaluating pre-owned wireless devices. ServiceCentral’s Director of Business Development, Chris Bleess, played a key role in these discussions. Established by CTIA’s Reverse Logistics and Service Quality (RLSQ) Working Group, the voluntary standard is the first of its kind to be introduced by companies representing the full wireless ecosystem, including device suppliers, wireless operators, insurance companies, logistics, parts suppliers and repair organizations.

“This collaboration by America’s wireless industry will make the grading of wireless devices more straightforward and consistent,” said Tom Sawanobori, CTIA SVP and Chief Technology Officer. “The standard will help create uniformity in the pre-owned device marketplace to better meet the needs of consumers and the larger wireless industry.”

Companies involved in repairing, refurbishing or redistributing wireless devices and their parts may use the standard to grade the condition of a mobile device. This will create more predictable device repair and trade-in experiences for consumers and retailers alike.

CTIA’s RLSQ Working Group convenes members representing the entire reverse logistics community to address industry challenges, set certification standards for technician training and device grading and develop requirements for service facilities and retail service excellence.

“Bringing consistency to the used device grading process is a significant development to support a predictable and quality customer experience,” said Martin Fijman, SVP Product and Supply Chain at Sprint.

“Establishing an industry grading standard for devices benefits the entire industry,” said Asurion Senior Vice President of Global Supply Chain, Amy Orem. “We applaud CTIA for pulling together industry leading companies to develop a standard that will help ensure consistency and clarity.”

More information on the CTIA RLSQ Working Group and the new wireless device grading standard is available here.