Business Standard

Cellular Firms Pull Out All The Stops For Boosting Std Calls

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BUSINESS STANDARD

Cellular operators are planning to waive local airtime charges for long-distance mobile calls. This means customers will have to pay only STD charges for making a long-distance call.

The operators are also in the process of finalising a plan under which customers will be offered mobile phones through an attractive financing scheme with an extended warranty of more than two years. Negotiations are on between with mobile phone companies and the operators for the latter to guarantee a certain volume of sales in return for reduced handset prices. Mobile phone firms currently offer warranties in the range of six months to one year.

 

The moves, being undertaken by a task force formed by the Cellular Operators' Association of India (COAI), is aimed at increasing the penetration of mobile phones in the country and encouraging basic phone users to mobile while making long-distance calls.

The recent price cuts have led COAI to rework its projections of mobile phone subscription growth. The association had earlier projected 10 million subscribers by March 31 next year. The revised projection is at around 12 million subscribers.

Cellular operators have also decided to make incoming calls free across the country irrespective of the operator or service provider. To start with, Bharti Televentures today announced free incoming calls for its subscribers in Gujarat from any part of the country. The customer has to pay Rs 75 per month for this offer, but the company has waived this fee in the first month. Hutchison-Essar is also expected to announce a similar scheme across the country. At the moment, it has announced free incoming calls only on its own seven networks across the country.

Mobile-to-mobile phone calls constitute more than 10 per cent of the total calls made on mobile phones. According to industry estimates, they constitute more than 20 per cent of the revenue. However, operators feel their loss in revenue will be compensated by the increase in airtime usage as well as the increase in the overall customer base of mobile phones in the country.


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First Published: Aug 06 2002 | 12:00 AM IST

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