(a) whether the Government proposes to make national roaming free for subscribers of all mobile operators in the country;
(b) if so, the details thereof;
(c) if not, the reasons therefor; and
(d) the reaction of different telecom companies thereto?
(a) whether the Government proposes to make national roaming free for subscribers of all mobile operators in the country;
(b) if so, the details thereof;
(c) if not, the reasons therefor; and
(d) the reaction of different telecom companies thereto?
THE MINISTER OF COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
(SHRI RAVI SHANKAR PRASAD)
(a) No, Madam.
(b) Not applicable in view of the above.
(c) The tariffs are normally fixed on work done principle and in roaming work is done to take call from home network to roaming network for incoming call and subscriber has to be authenticated for his outgoing call. This amounts to work done. In the simplest case, the removal of charges for incoming calls while roaming could result in non-recovery of charges for the work done by the TSPs in carrying the call from home service area to the visited service area.
(d) TRAI has issued 60th Amendment to Telecom Tariff Order (TTO), 1999 (3 of 2015) which is effective from 1st May, 2015. This amendment has mandated “Special Roaming Tariff Plan” or SRTP, which means a tariff plan in which on payment of fixed charge, if any, the incoming voice call while on national roaming is free.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) has launched free incoming voice call facility while in National Roaming under all post-paid and prepaid GSM mobile plans offered to subscribers initially for a period of One year w.e.f. 15.06.2015.
All the wireless access service providers including BSNL and MTNL have tariff plans in which the incoming calls while roaming are free.
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