Trai Unlikely To Pare Inter-connect Charges Drastically

[ravi_patent 28]

http://www.moneycontrol.com/india/news/bus...stically/385740

The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of India, TRAI is unlikely to drastically pare telecom inter-connect charges, reports CNBC-TV18 quoting sources. There are reports that call origination charges will continue on forebearance and call carriage charge ceiling of 65 paise per minute may be pared slightly. Termination charge for international calls will also be put on forebearance and termination charges for other calls are likely to be lowered by 5-8 paise per minute.

TRAI is struggling to balance aspirations of existing and new telcom companies. It is reported that the regulator will hold one more consultation on February 26 before finalising new IUC (interconnection usage charge) regime.

Termination charge is 30 paise per minute for all calls as of now. Lower term charges will impact Bharti Airtel, Vodafone revenue flows and would benefit new telecom companies and operators like Reliance Communications (RCom).

[vvinayakpai 26]

http://www.moneycontrol.com/india/news/bus...stically/385740

The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of India, TRAI is unlikely to drastically pare telecom inter-connect charges, reports CNBC-TV18 quoting sources. There are reports that call origination charges will continue on forebearance and call carriage charge ceiling of 65 paise per minute may be pared slightly. Termination charge for international calls will also be put on forebearance and termination charges for other calls are likely to be lowered by 5-8 paise per minute.

TRAI is struggling to balance aspirations of existing and new telcom companies. It is reported that the regulator will hold one more consultation on February 26 before finalising new IUC (interconnection usage charge) regime.

Termination charge is 30 paise per minute for all calls as of now. Lower term charges will impact Bharti Airtel, Vodafone revenue flows and would benefit new telecom companies and operators like Reliance Communications (RCom).

New telcos, RCOM want lower termination fee, GSM cos oppose

4 Mar 2009, 1922 hrs IST, PTI

NEW DELHI: New telecom operators such as Swan, Unitech, Datacom and Loop, and Reliance Communications have asked regulator TRAI to reduce the

termination charges, while existing GSM players, led by Bharti, want the 30 paise per minute charge to continue.

Deciding on the new mobile termination charge is going to be a tough call for TRAI given these extreme positions and the fact that a lower termination fee in the overall review of interconnection charge will impact the retail tariff.

Termination charge is the fee given by an operator, on whose network a call originates, to the operator on whose network the call ends.

"The termination charge for new entrants is a cost and not revenue. The charge has a direct bearing on retail tariffs. Higher the termination charge, higher will be the retail tariffs and therefore it is anti-consumer, besides reducing the margins and competitive ability of new entrants to match the tariffs of the established and large operators.

The termination charge is around 30-50 per cent of the total retail tariff. The new entrants will have to match or provide lower tariffs than incumbent operators charge", said the new operators in their presentation to TRAI.

Reliance Communications, which has both GSM and CDMA operations, said reduction in mobile termination charge (MTC) would lead to substantial drop in retail tariff.

[SUDYEcaZ 67]

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Mobile...how/4245530.cms

Mobile call rates set to come down by up to 20%

NEW DELHI: STD and local calls tariffs for mobile users are set to come down by up to 20% from April 1 onwards. Telecom regulator TRAI on Monday directed that termination charges be slashed by upto 33% to Rs 20 paise per minute.

Termination fee is the charges paid by one operator to another for enabling the calls to move between the networks. For instance, if a Bharti Airtel customer makes call to Vodafone subscriber, Airtel will pay 30 paise per minute to Vodafone as termination charges. Any reduction in termination charges will result in a direct reduction in mobile tariffs.

Overseas calls to India will also become more expensive from Arpil 1. TRAI has allowed Indian telcos such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Essar, Reliance Communications, Idea Cellular and Aircel to charge foreign telcos more for terminating overseas calls in India.

Indian telcos can charge foreign operators 33% more for all incoming calls that terminate in India. So far, Indian regulations did not allow telcos to charge more than 30 paise per minute for bringing calls into India, but TRAI has now increased it to 40 paise per minute.

"Termination charge for incoming international calls would be 40 paise per minute against the existing charge of 30 paise per minute. The Authority expects that the service providers would pass on this benefit in the form of lower tariff for outgoing international calls," TRAI said in a statement.

India gets 3 minutes of overseas calls for every minute of ISD traffic it sends out. Telcos say the high ratio of incoming calls from other countries should be utilised to earn foreign exchange.

Leading telcos say that increasing termination rates for international telcos will not impact domestic consumers. They have also said that they would use these additional revenues to lower ISD tariffs for domestic consumers in India.

Edited March 9, 2009 by SUDYEcaZ

[savramesh 37]

wow, happy news !!!! only indian telecom provides the world's cheapest tariff.. hope this will help atleast a small % in economic slow down..

[savramesh 37]

Termination charge slashed; GSM cos say no scope to cut tariff

Telecom regulator TRAI has lowered the domestic termination charge for operators by 33 percent but the GSM service providers expressed disappointment and said there was no scope for reducing the tariffs.

GSM operators' lobby COAI said that the charge should rather have been increased to 35 paise a minute.

Industry experts said this initiative is expected to reduce the existing call rates by 25 percent.

State-owned BSNL, which was advocating for lower termination charge for mobile-to-mobile calls, also remained non-committal on tariff changes saying they need to study the impact.

Tata Teleservices, on other hand, welcomed the move and said this would lead to reduction in call charges.

"We welcome the move. This will bring down tariffs and benefit the Indian telecom consumers," Tata Teleservices said in a statement.

AUSPI, an association of CDMA operators, welcomed the TRAI decision but was silent on tariff cut.

New operators like Datacom Solutions, Unitech and Loop Telecom and Swan among others were demanding 0-10 paise per minute termination charge, whereas the existing GSM operators were opposing any reduction in the charges, fearing that there revenue would take a hit.

Source DD News

[ravi_patent 28]

imp point

1.The ceiling on carriage of domestic long distance calls retained at 65 paise per minute. Trai expects the non-reduction of this ceiling to encourage national long distance operators to expand into rural areas.

http://www.business-standard.com/india/new...e-down/56369/on

@ramesh

only termination charges and not the tariffs were reduced.worlds cheapest tariffs is a misleading point.that is due to rupee to dollar conversion ratio.and considering that by devaluation of rupee from 38 to 50 against dollar our tariffs have become lesser in dollar terms but not for us.also no country divides itself into various parts and allows roaming charge.

[savramesh 37]

^^^

thanks for correcting me...

[ravi_patent 28]

"Even though there is a linkage between lower termination charge and lower tariffs the result is not as obvious or immediate. Lower termination charges do not mandate operators to lower tariffs though it provides a strong incentive to do so. TRAI chairman N Misra told TOI, "Tariffs are a function of market forces. It is not mandatory upon operators to reduce the tariffs".

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/article...2,prtpage-1.cms

The regulator has also proposed to reduction in the carriage from the current level of 20 paise a minute to 15. This could result in lower tariffs for calls made from a private operators network to BSNL’s 35 million fixed line users

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2009/0...31051340400.htm

meanwhile shyam sistema says

Where is the logic in retaining this 65 paise/minute tariff, which was specified in 2003? Especially considering that most of the existing operators have already recovered the cost of building their networks,” said a top executive with Shyam-Sistema. These five new entrants are slated to meet Trai shortly.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/N...890.cms?curpg=2

[ravi_patent 28]

Trai tries again

http://www.business-standard.com/india/new...s-again/351428/

With the rapid increase in the number of telecom subscribers and the equally large surge in usage, you would expect the costs of calls to keep coming down. And so they have, to levels where they are probably the lowest in the world. Which is why telecom users across the country celebrated when the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) mandated a further cut of 10 paise per minute in what are called ‘termination’ charges — or the tariff calls paid by Vodafone, say, to Idea when a Vodafone subscriber calls an Idea subscriber. In effect, this could mean a 10 per cent reduction in telecom tariffs. Users, however, would be well advised to not uncork any bottles just yet. For one, the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) is already in appeal against the earlier Trai order which fixed such ‘termination’ charges at 30 paise a minute (the latest order cuts them to 20 paise) — the case has just concluded at the Telecom Dispute Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) and a judgment is expected any day. If the judgment strikes down the earlier ‘termination’ charge as unfair, it is obvious what will happen to the new one.

In any call, there is an ‘origination charge’ paid to the company whose network you belong to, a carriage charge for carrying the call from one network to the other and a ‘termination charge’ paid to the network on which the call terminates. At the end of the day, the dispute is about what costs have to be covered through the ‘termination’ charge. The COAI view is that since companies like Vodafone are spending thousands of crores of rupees to set up new networks (which could get clogged each time there is a call from an Airtel network to the Vodafone network), the capital costs have to be included while calculating the ‘termination’ charge. Trai’s view, on the other hand, is that companies are increasingly not spending on setting up infrastructure (many telecom providers have hived off their telecom towers business, for instance), so the capex is really irrelevant — all the matters is the operating expenses or opex. But what if a company does need to spend capex? Trai’s view is that ‘service providers are free to recover their capex from the rental, and the origination charge that is under forbearance’ — in other words, charge less from others who want to use your network but charge more from your own customers! There are several such instances of differences between the COAI and Trai and, like the previous case of fixing ‘termination’ charges which is before the TDSAT, this case too is likely to end up there. The COAI says that if the ‘termination’ charges are kept too low, it will affect the telephone companies’ ability to set up rural networks (since rural customers receive more calls than they make, the ‘termination’ charge is a big source of revenue here); COAI’s estimate is that a 35 paise charge is the correct one to take care of future expansion costs as well. Trai, on its part, cites the high Ebitda (earnings before interest, depreciation and amortisation charges) margins of telcos to refute this.

There is ad hocism in the current system of fixing cost ceilings. Trai recognises that telcos over-charge on SMSs, but there has been no move to rein these in. Similarly, while fixing ‘carriage charges’ for long distance calls, Trai said it ‘had provided (a) mark up of 25 per cent on the weighted average cost of carriage of NLDOs (national long distance operators) at that time’. While fixing carriage charges for long-distance calls, Trai relied on old traffic data; the use of new data would have resulted in the lowering of long distance carriage charges. In short, any tariff setting has to look at all costs, and not just at parts of the whole. In an ideal world with so much competition, it can be argued that termination charges should be freed up. This however is not feasible as players with large market power (Bharti has the biggest network today) can hike up charges so as to kill the competition. There is, however, a case for looking at all costs, in a more comprehensive manner.

Edited March 11, 2009 by ravi_patent

[Himanshu Singh 19]

Telcos need incentives to go to rural areas? What a joke? The hitherto untapped rural market in itself is the biggest incentive. Those who ignore rural telephony will do so at their own peril. Urban centres are already saturated. Villages are going to be the new growth engines of telecom industry... The cut in termination fee will not lead to cut in tariff as of now atleast for the existing GSM ROBBERS AND BEGGARS. Reason is simple- economic slowdown coupled with ever falling ARPUs.. Its only the new entrants who can offer something cheaper. i suspect reliance might do something..but what happens to virgin scheme of 10 paisa on incoming? they were giving 10 paisa of termination fee of 30 paisa to their customers..

[vvinayakpai 26]

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Mobile...how/4245530.cms

Mobile call rates set to come down by up to 20%

NEW DELHI: STD and local calls tariffs for mobile users are set to come down by up to 20% from April 1 onwards. Telecom regulator TRAI on Monday directed that termination charges be slashed by upto 33% to Rs 20 paise per minute.

Termination fee is the charges paid by one operator to another for enabling the calls to move between the networks. For instance, if a Bharti Airtel customer makes call to Vodafone subscriber, Airtel will pay 30 paise per minute to Vodafone as termination charges. Any reduction in termination charges will result in a direct reduction in mobile tariffs.

Overseas calls to India will also become more expensive from Arpil 1. TRAI has allowed Indian telcos such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Essar, Reliance Communications, Idea Cellular and Aircel to charge foreign telcos more for terminating overseas calls in India.

Indian telcos can charge foreign operators 33% more for all incoming calls that terminate in India. So far, Indian regulations did not allow telcos to charge more than 30 paise per minute for bringing calls into India, but TRAI has now increased it to 40 paise per minute.

"Termination charge for incoming international calls would be 40 paise per minute against the existing charge of 30 paise per minute. The Authority expects that the service providers would pass on this benefit in the form of lower tariff for outgoing international calls," TRAI said in a statement.

India gets 3 minutes of overseas calls for every minute of ISD traffic it sends out. Telcos say the high ratio of incoming calls from other countries should be utilised to earn foreign exchange.

Leading telcos say that increasing termination rates for international telcos will not impact domestic consumers. They have also said that they would use these additional revenues to lower ISD tariffs for domestic consumers in India.

Any information whether RCOM is going to reduce their tariffs after the termination costs are cut?

ALso, have the new termination costs been approved by the DoT?

This is because the COAI has already filed a case against the termination costs when it was fixed at 30ps/min when it was fixed in 2003. That judgement is due anytime from TDSAT. If that judgement is ruled in favour of COAI, then the current TRAI order to further reduce the termination costs to 20ps/min will automatically be nullified. COAI had filed a case that the termination costs, according to international best practices must be fixed at at least 35ps/min.

Even though TRAI has suggested these changes in the termination rates with effect from April 1st, 2009, it has to be approved by the Department of Telecom. Now with election coming in the way, I am not sure whether the Government would be forbidden from approving the order keeping in mind the poll of conduct.

[vvinayakpai 26]

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Mobile...how/4245530.cms

Mobile call rates set to come down by up to 20%

NEW DELHI: STD and local calls tariffs for mobile users are set to come down by up to 20% from April 1 onwards. Telecom regulator TRAI on Monday directed that termination charges be slashed by upto 33% to Rs 20 paise per minute.

Termination fee is the charges paid by one operator to another for enabling the calls to move between the networks. For instance, if a Bharti Airtel customer makes call to Vodafone subscriber, Airtel will pay 30 paise per minute to Vodafone as termination charges. Any reduction in termination charges will result in a direct reduction in mobile tariffs.

Overseas calls to India will also become more expensive from Arpil 1. TRAI has allowed Indian telcos such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Essar, Reliance Communications, Idea Cellular and Aircel to charge foreign telcos more for terminating overseas calls in India.

Indian telcos can charge foreign operators 33% more for all incoming calls that terminate in India. So far, Indian regulations did not allow telcos to charge more than 30 paise per minute for bringing calls into India, but TRAI has now increased it to 40 paise per minute.

"Termination charge for incoming international calls would be 40 paise per minute against the existing charge of 30 paise per minute. The Authority expects that the service providers would pass on this benefit in the form of lower tariff for outgoing international calls," TRAI said in a statement.

India gets 3 minutes of overseas calls for every minute of ISD traffic it sends out. Telcos say the high ratio of incoming calls from other countries should be utilised to earn foreign exchange.

Leading telcos say that increasing termination rates for international telcos will not impact domestic consumers. They have also said that they would use these additional revenues to lower ISD tariffs for domestic consumers in India.

Any information whether RCOM is going to reduce their tariffs after the termination costs are cut?

ALso, have the new termination costs been approved by the DoT?

This is because the COAI has already filed a case against the termination costs when it was fixed at 30ps/min when it was fixed in 2003. That judgement is due anytime from TDSAT. If that judgement is ruled in favour of COAI, then the current TRAI order to further reduce the termination costs to 20ps/min will automatically be nullified. COAI had filed a case that the termination costs, according to international best practices must be fixed at at least 35ps/min.

Even though TRAI has suggested these changes in the termination rates with effect from April 1st, 2009, it has to be approved by the Department of Telecom. Now with election coming in the way, I am not sure whether the Government would be forbidden from approving the order keeping in mind the poll of conduct.

As suspected, BSNL has filed an appeal in TDSAT against the TRAI order specifying the termination costs to mobiles and landlines at 20ps/min. BSNL\'s plea is that termination costs to landlines have to be higher as the cost incurred structure is different for a landline from a mobile phone. BSNL is of the contention that the landline termination costs have to be at least 3-4 times the termination costs of a mobile.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/N...how/4335772.cms

Somebody had to play spoilsport in this party!!!!!!!!

Edited March 31, 2009 by vvinayakpai

[vvinayakpai 26]

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Mobile...how/4245530.cms

Mobile call rates set to come down by up to 20%

NEW DELHI: STD and local calls tariffs for mobile users are set to come down by up to 20% from April 1 onwards. Telecom regulator TRAI on Monday directed that termination charges be slashed by upto 33% to Rs 20 paise per minute.

Termination fee is the charges paid by one operator to another for enabling the calls to move between the networks. For instance, if a Bharti Airtel customer makes call to Vodafone subscriber, Airtel will pay 30 paise per minute to Vodafone as termination charges. Any reduction in termination charges will result in a direct reduction in mobile tariffs.

Overseas calls to India will also become more expensive from Arpil 1. TRAI has allowed Indian telcos such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Essar, Reliance Communications, Idea Cellular and Aircel to charge foreign telcos more for terminating overseas calls in India.

Indian telcos can charge foreign operators 33% more for all incoming calls that terminate in India. So far, Indian regulations did not allow telcos to charge more than 30 paise per minute for bringing calls into India, but TRAI has now increased it to 40 paise per minute.

"Termination charge for incoming international calls would be 40 paise per minute against the existing charge of 30 paise per minute. The Authority expects that the service providers would pass on this benefit in the form of lower tariff for outgoing international calls," TRAI said in a statement.

India gets 3 minutes of overseas calls for every minute of ISD traffic it sends out. Telcos say the high ratio of incoming calls from other countries should be utilised to earn foreign exchange.

Leading telcos say that increasing termination rates for international telcos will not impact domestic consumers. They have also said that they would use these additional revenues to lower ISD tariffs for domestic consumers in India.

Any information whether RCOM is going to reduce their tariffs after the termination costs are cut?

ALso, have the new termination costs been approved by the DoT?

This is because the COAI has already filed a case against the termination costs when it was fixed at 30ps/min when it was fixed in 2003. That judgement is due anytime from TDSAT. If that judgement is ruled in favour of COAI, then the current TRAI order to further reduce the termination costs to 20ps/min will automatically be nullified. COAI had filed a case that the termination costs, according to international best practices must be fixed at at least 35ps/min.

Even though TRAI has suggested these changes in the termination rates with effect from April 1st, 2009, it has to be approved by the Department of Telecom. Now with election coming in the way, I am not sure whether the Government would be forbidden from approving the order keeping in mind the poll of conduct.

As suspected, BSNL has filed an appeal in TDSAT against the TRAI order specifying the termination costs to mobiles and landlines at 20ps/min. BSNL\'s plea is that termination costs to landlines have to be higher as the cost incurred structure is different for a landline from a mobile phone. BSNL is of the contention that the landline termination costs have to be at least 3-4 times the termination costs of a mobile.

Somebody had to play spoilsport in this party!!!!!!!!

COAI joins in the fight against TRAI.

http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/006200903301811.htm

[vvinayakpai 26]

COAI and AUSPI want to be added as parties to the case filed by BSNL regarding reducing the interconnect charges.

http://www.business-standard.com/india/new...lation/57709/on

[savramesh 37]

Business Line

Sunday, April 12, 2009

AUSPI moves TDSAT against TRAI regulation

NEW DELHI: The CDMA lobby group AUSPI has approached the telecom tribunal TDSAT against regulator TRAI because the association feels it (TRAI) has not reduced connectivity charges between operators enough.

In its petition, the Association of Unified Telecom Service Providers of India (AUSPI) has submitted that TRAI set 20 paise per minute as mobile termination charges (MTC) in an “arbitrary manner”.

State-controlled BSNL has already approached the TDSAT on the matter. Requesting the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal to quash the TRAI notification, the AUSPI further submitted that as per its calculation, the cost of MTC is below 10 paise per minute.

The Association said that TRAI's calculation was not based on a “correct costing methodology and exaggerated per subscriber cost projection”.

Termination charges are paid by an operator to another on whose network the call ends.

The AUSPI further submitted that the TRAI's notification was anti-competitive and against the consumer's interest as it would add additional burden by increasing the rates that operators charge one another.

In its regulation on March 9, TRAI reduced termination charge for all types of domestic calls like landline to landline, landline to mobile, mobile to landline and mobile to mobile to 20 paise per minute from 30 paise per minute. - PTI

[savramesh 37]

The Hindu

Tuesday, April 14, 2009 : 1915 Hrs

TDSAT issues notice to TRAI over termination charges

New Delhi (PTI): The telecom tribunal TDSAT has issued notice to sectoral regulator TRAI over the latter's recent regulation reducing mobile termination charges to 20 paise per minute.

Admitting a petition filed by the Association of Unified Telecom Service Providers of India (AUSPI) challenging the March 9 regulation of TRAI, the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal issued notice to the regulator and directed it to file reply by April 24.

During the proceedings, the counsel appearing for GSM lobby group COAI also submitted that the body would also challenge TRAI's March 9 regulation.

After that, the TDSAT bench headed by Justice Kumar said that all the petitions filed by BSNL, COAI and AUSPI would be listed together for hearing on May 5.

In its regulation on March 9, TRAI reduced termination charges for all types of domestic calls such as landline to landline, landline to mobile, mobile to landline and mobile to mobile to 20 paise per minute from 30 paise per minute.

Termination charges are paid by an operator to another on whose network the call ends.