Airtel, Vodafone call Jio tariffs a gimmick

Firms come out with detailed communique for consumers that counter Jio's claims of cheap data

Both Bharti Airtel and Vodafone, the incumbents in the telecom sector, have come out with identical communiqués for their customers, claiming that the Jio tariff plan, unveiled days before, wasn’t as good as it looked.

Comparative charts in the communications highlight the difference between plans offered by the new entrant and the incumbents. These also question the quality of Jio’s voice network, and explain how Jio is not offering data at Rs 50 per GB as it has claimed.

Last week, Jio had announced it would offer data at Rs 50 per GB and voice calls would be free all across India.

Airtel, the country’s largest telecom services provider, has countered Reliance Jio’s tariff plans and called it a “marketing gimmick”.  Vodafone, on the other hand, has asked if Jio’s claim of Rs 50 per GB of data is “reality or packaging.”

A detailed chart compares what Jio is offering with its own existing plans, which shows that Jio’s data pricing is not offering data at Rs 50 per GB.

When contacted on the customer communication, Airtel declined to comment. Vodafone, on the other hand, confirmed that the communication was correct.

Both companies have compared all of Jio’s plans with their own to show that both are offering value to their customers.

Free voice, which is Jio’s purported big game changer, has also been given a thumbs-down.

Both Vodafone and Airtel have argued that their voice service works on all devices (Jio’s voice will work on VoLTE-enabled 4G handsets).

Airtel has claimed there are issues with Jio’s 4G network in highways and rural areas. Jio is offering voice on its 4G network without a circuit-switched fallback option (traditional 2G voice). Vodafone argues that its network is stable and established.

Both companies also have also argued, independently, that Jio is currently linked to handsets.

Jio’s free welcome offer is for a registered handset, which essentially means that if the SIM is put in another device the welcome offer is not valid.

Airtel’s communiqué said: “Free benefit available on Jio is applicable for only one handset registered. Benefits are not transferred once user changes the handset.”If a user plans to use Jio service for voice calls only, which Jio has declared free, the consumer needs to spend minimum Rs 149. Similarly, if a user uses Jio’s mobile services for data (1 GB) then he needs to shell out a minimum Rs 500 to avail the data service.

Jio also has a limited 4G network and thus it may have issues in rural areas.

Airtel and Vodafone, in comparison, have larger network coverage which includes 4G, 3G and 2G. In addition, for Jio, calling is not possible if data coverage is not there, which is not the case for either Airtel or Vodafone since users can make calls even if there is no data coverage.