December 1st, the day when Indian telecom’s biggest price-related disruption happened, has also introduced a new way of charing users.
On December 1st, Airtel, Jio and Vodafone-Idea declared that they will increase their mobile tariff, thereby impacting 90% of the telecom users in India. Along with their new charges, Airtel and Vodafone has also announced that they will now charge for the calls, which are made to other networks.
Jio hasn’t announced any such new charge as of now, but they have already announced this new charge in the month of October this year.
What does this mean? And how will be the users impacted?
Airtel, Vodafone Will Charge 6 Paisa For Calls Outside Their Network
Both Airtel and Vodafone will now charge 6 paisa for each call, which is made outside their network.
This special charge will be made, once the allocated ‘free calls’ under the specifc plans are exhausted. The total number of free calls to other networks, have been provided by both Airtel and Vodafone, under their new pricing.
For example, in the case of Airtel, they are offering free calls to other networks in this manner:
- 1000 minutes under 28 days plan
- 3000 minutes under 84 days plan
- 12000 minutes under 365 days plan
Now, once this ‘quota’ of free call to off-network is over, every call will be charged 6 paisa. This means Airtel to Vodafone or Jio/BSNL.
Similarly, the calls from Vodafone to Airtel or Jio, BSNL after the free quota of off-network is over, will be charged 6 paisa per minute.
In the month of October Jio had introduced this new charge of 6 paisa to other networks, that is Jio to Airtel and Jio to Vodafone or BSNL.
This can be termed as an additional charge.
Why Telecom Operators Are Resorting To This Additional Charge?
This new charge of 6 paisa is related to the IUC or Interconnect Usage Charge.
In case an Airtel user makes a call to say Jio, then Jio needs to pay 6 paisa as IUC to Airtel, for accepting the call on their network.
6 paisa IUC has been designated as IUC, for every telecom operator, and is subjective to more reviews, in the coming days.
It is clear that telecom operators are now pushing for more revenues, and this new charge of off-network calls is just the beginning.
We will keep you updated, as we receive more updates.
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