Telecom companies have threatened to stop offering roaming services if the Government forces through a policy to make national roaming free of charge. Mobile companies have told the telecom regulator that such a policy would wipe out 10 per cent of their annual revenues, and this would be hard to sustain.

“If the incoming national roaming charges are made zero then either we will be forced to stop giving roaming services to our GSM subscribers or we would take a high financial hit. We would not be surprised if the incumbent operators will not provide the roaming service to smaller operators,” Tata Teleservices said in a written communication to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).

Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal had earlier announced that national roaming charges would be waived this year as part of the New Telecom Policy. Once roaming charges are waived, mobile users can get incoming calls free of charge and make outgoing calls at local rates while travelling anywhere in the country.

The policy was approved by the Union Cabinet last May.

Comments sought

TRAI has floated a consultation paper to seek the comments of operators. Currently, operators are free to fix mobile tariffs, including for roaming services, without any regulatory intervention.

Operators charge Re 1 per minute for incoming calls and Rs 1.50 per minute for outgoing calls while roaming. An SMS is also priced at Rs 1.50 per message. All the operators, barring Reliance Communications, have opposed the proposed move to enforce a regulation to make roaming free.

Bharti Airtel said that cost of offering services has increased over the last five years, especially with the spectrum price increasing 7-8 times.

“We suggest that the roaming tariff under the prevalent hyper-competitive market conditions should continue to be kept under the time-tested policy of forbearance,” Airtel said in its response to the TRAI paper. Mobile players said that they would be forced to increase overall tariffs to make up for the loss in revenue as a result of the Government policy.

They said that roaming services are used mostly by high-end users and, hence, a waiver in charges would impact the general consumers.

“Any attempt to regulate the roaming tariffs for the benefit of small fraction of users is likely to compel operators to revise their general tariffs and that will invariably affect the masses,” said Idea Cellular.

However, officials in the Department of Telecom said that the Government will push through with the policy despite opposition from the operators.

“The Government has to look at the consumer’s interest. Threats by the industry may only be posturing as no operator can afford not to give roaming services,” said a senior DoT official.

Impact on tariffs

Reliance Communications has backed the Government view and said that the net impact on overall tariffs would only be between 3-5 paise if roaming charges are waived.

“Abolition of roaming charges will lead to increase in minutes of usage and therefore service providers will not feel any adverse revenue impact,” RCom said.

While mobile users wait for the roaming charges to be abolished, industry watchers said opposition by the telecom companies could force the Government to give them sops to implement this scheme.

> Thomas.thomas@thehindu.co.in

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