The Hindu Business Line : TRAI move may make mobile roaming dearer

In a move that could increase mobile roaming charges, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India is looking at the option of giving a share of the revenue earned from a roaming subscriber to the operator on whose network the call terminates.

At present the revenue earned from a roaming call is divided between two operators and if TRAI decides to go through with the proposal, the revenue will be shared between three operators. This may force the operators to jack up the tariff to accommodate the revenue share with the third operator.

For instance, when a Delhi subscriber roams in Mumbai and makes a call to an MTNL subscriber there, the revenue earned from the calls that he makes, is at present, divided between the Delhi operator to whom he has subscribed and the Mumbai operator on whose network he is roaming. As per the new option proposedby TRAI in a consultation paper, a part of the revenue earned will be given to MTNL as well.

Operators said that a three way split of revenues from roaming would be a retrograde move, as it would benefit only state owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd. Cellular operators fear that since BSNL has control over more than 50 per cent of the country's telecom subscriber base, the net out go in the event of a revenue share would be in favour of the public sector company.

In support of the move, TRAI said in the consultation paper that roaming is a value-added service and revenue generated from this service needs to be shared between operators on the basis of mutual agreements. TRAI pointed out that while operators are charging as high as Rs 100 per minute from international roaming users, the terminating operator gets paid at the rate of only 30 paise per minute.

On the downside, the regulator has acknowledged that permitting revenue share between visiting and terminating network service providers may distort the market and perhaps could lead to hike in roaming tariff to the end consumer.

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