Telecom Tariffs

IBDF President K Madhavan welcomes move; says result of constructive dialogue

Telecom operator Vodafone Idea (VIL) has said telecom tariffs in India continue to remain at "unsustainable levels" and the industry needs "tariff correction" to support continued investments. VIL has seen average revenue per user (ARPU) growth for five consecutive quarters now. Its average revenue or realisation per user at Rs 131 in Q2 FY23 was 19.5 per cent higher than the year-ago period, aided mostly by tariff hikes and subscriber upgrades. ARPU for the September quarter was higher sequentially as well, when compared to Rs 128 in Q1 FY23. "However, it is important to note that despite the price intervention made in the last one year, the tariffs in India continue to remain at unsustainable levels. And we believe that industry needs further tariff correction to support the continued investments going forward," Vodafone Idea CEO Akshaya Moondra said during the company's analyst call on Q2 FY23 earnings on Friday. Over the last one year, the company has taken several tariff ...

An analysis from shows that while overall bills are lower in India in absolute terms, they are a larger share of monthly income than in many economies

Global telecom gearmaker Ericsson's senior vice-president Nunzio Mirtillo believes that India will see one of the fastest 5G adoptions in the world

They say tariff could be raised even for 4G services in a bid to increase 5G adoption

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has issued an order to re-verify the SIM of subscribers holding beyond nine connections across India and six connections in the case of Jammu and Kashmir, North East and Assam and disconnect in the case of non-verification. The subscribers will be given the option to choose the connection they want to retain and deactivate the rest of the connections, according to the order issued on December 7. "If during the data analytics carried out by DoT, it is found that an individual subscriber is having more than nine mobile connections (six in the case of J&K, NE and Assam LSAs) across all the TSPs (telecom service providers), all the mobile connections will be flagged for re-verification," the DoT order said. The order comes from DoT to check incidence of financial crimes, pesky calls, automated calls and fraudulent activities. The DoT has asked telecom operators to remove all the flagged mobile connections from the database that are not in use

Vodafone Idea's market share loss, according to reports, has continued in the first half of fiscal 2021-22 (H1-FY22) though the pace of market share loss has moderated

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Telcos offering segmented tariff offerings has been a bone of contention for a while

The telecom regulator however is unlikely to set a minimum tariff as it may be considered an anti-competitive move

The company has discontinued its Rs 49 entry level prepaid recharge and will now start from the Rs 79 smart recharge and offer more value to customers

Vodafone-Idea has been looking to raise around Rs 25,000 crore for the last nine months

ICRA expects total industry debt to remain elevated at Rs. 4.7 lakh crore as on March 31, 2022

Telecom service providers are expected to dial in next round of tariff hikes over the next one or two quarters

CLSA believes that new Jio postpaid plans are bundling three leading OTTs, but with no content exclusivity, can be matched by incumbents like Bharti Airtel