The Hindu Business Line : Reliance extends 40 paise offer to all WLL networks

IN a move that is likely to stump the cellular operators who have been objecting to the 40 paise per minute STD calls being offered by Reliance Infocomm on its own networks, the company has now decided to extend this price to all long distance calls made to the limited mobility phones of Tata Teleservices, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL).

According to company officials, the new tariffs are due to be filed with the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), as mandated by it, five working days before the commercial launch on May 1.

They noted that this change was being brought about as the TRAI had sought clarifications on its earlier STD rates, as they were only on Reliance-to-Reliance phones and was "discriminatory" in nature. By extending this price to all other networks of the same service (limited mobility), this criticism is sought to be taken care of.

The cellular operators who had been the main opponents of the 40 paise STD tariff could not object, since they too offered similar discounts for mobile-to-mobile calls, the officials said.

Earlier the company had told the TRAI that if it is not allowed to charge STD intra-network calls at 40 paise per minute, the cellular operators too ought to be prevented from offering lower airtime rates for calls within their networks. If non-discriminatory tariff principle is to be implemented, it should be implemented for all, and not to be applied selectively only for basic operators.

The authority should mandate all operators to announce single tariff for each type of call, that is total tariff for a call including applicable interconnect charge. For years, cellular operators are announcing differential airtime for within network calls and outside network calls, it had stated.

However, now with its commercial launch date drawing closer, and the subscriber base yet to reach the targeted levels, the company has decided to alter its tariffs without causing much confusion to its subscribers. Even if it means that it will have to end up retaining a very small portion of such STD calls, due to the access charges that it has to pay to other operators.

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