The Hindu Business Line : DoT in favour of Net telephony

New Delhi, Feb. 13 The Department of Telecom has said that it was in favour of introducing unrestricted Internet telephony but had issues relating to level playing field between telecom players and Internet Service Providers.

The DoT has asked the telecom regulator’s views on how parity should be brought between unified access licence holders who pay between 6 and 10 per cent of their income as licence fee and ISPs who will pay a flat fee of 6 per cent.

The DoT reckons that once unrestricted Net telephony is allowed then it could be complementary service to existing mobile and fixed line telephone services, in which case telecom firms could be at a disadvantage compared to an ISP.

“The Telecom Commission recognises the need to encourage Internet telephony for wider penetration of voice services. However, it is felt that before this can be done, there are a number of issues which need to be resolved. This includes level-playing field between unified access licensees and Net telephone providers, entry fee for ISPs who want to offer the service and security related issues,” said a DoT official.

At present, ISPs are allowed to offer Net telephony only for international calls. For domestic calls, it is permitted only for PC to PC calls.

Though unified operators are allowed to offer the service no one has launched it in India till now. Therefore, TRAI had suggested allowing ISPs to offer unrestricted Net telephony even for domestic calls in a bid to offer more choice to consumers.

ISPs said that if the Government increases the licence fee or imposes additional entry fee then it will make Net telephony unviable for them.

There are two advantages of using Net Telephone service compared to a traditional phone call. Compared to current STD rates, Net telephony is expected to be much cheaper because the cost of offering the service for the operator is lower.

Second, users can make or receive calls at the same tariff wherever they are as long as they are connected to the Internet. While cellular users can also avail themselves of telephone services wherever they are, subscribers have to pay hefty roaming charges if they are moving outside their State.

In the case of Net telephony, subscribers can simply plug in their laptop or an IP phone to the Internet (for example in your hotel room) and all the calls will come to you.

There are some disadvantages too. You lose the phone service if there is no power. The quality of the call depends on the quality of connection; if you have got good bandwidth all the time, you'll never notice, but quality suffers if things slow down.

Apart from general consumers, unrestricted Net telephony will also benefit the enterprise segment, particularly the business process outsourcing sector. At present, these companies are not allowed to connect with the traditional telecom network within the country.

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