The Hindu Business Line : Shorter calls to cost less as BSNL rejigs PCO biz

In a bid to revamp its PCO business strategy, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd has decreased the tariffs for local calls made from PCOs even as the company matched it by lowering the pulse rate significantly. The company has also increased the commission for PCO booth owners up to 10 per cent.

As per the revised tariff, a local call made from a PCO booth to a fixed line phone will cost Rs 1.20 for a 90-second call. Until now, a two-minute call cost Rs 2. So if one were to make a two-minute call now, it would cost 20 per cent more at Rs 2.40. The upside, however, is that the new package allows callers to make just a 50-second call and pay only Rs 1.20. Under the present system, the subscriber had to pay Rs 2 even for a short duration call.

The revised rates come into effect from April 1 onwards.

Tariffs for calls made on coin box public telephones have also been revised upwards. While at present you can make a 90-second call with a one-rupee coin, the new tariff will allow only a 60-second call for the same amount. The good news, however, is that from now you can also make calls to mobile phones using a coin box phone.

Calls made from a PCO to a mobile subscriber of private operators such as Airtel and Hutch will also cost more. From Rs 2 for a two-minute call at present, BSNL will now charge Rs 1.20 for a call of 45 seconds made from its PCOs. The same amount can be used to make a 60-second call to a BSNL mobile subscriber.

BSNL officials said the company was deploying differential tariffing for private mobile operators for competitive reasons. Cellular operators may protest this as they have done against Reliance Infocomm's unlimited call package.

For PCO booth owners, BSNL has increased the commission to a maximum of 35 per cent. It has introduced a slab system whereby booths with higher minutes of use get a higher share of the revenue collected. At present, BSNL gives a flat commission varying between 20 per cent and 25 per cent. BSNL officials said the restructuring was done considering the demands from the PCO booth owners who were being offered similar terms by private operators.

The BSNL move is seen as an attempt to thwart competition from private players moving into the PCO business segment in a big way. The number of PCO booths went up from 18 lakh in December 2003 to 23 lakh at the end of 2004. BSNL and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd account for about 20-lakh booths. However, private operators such as Reliance Infocomm have about 1.3-lakh PCO booths and are spreading its network into the rural segment as well.

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