Jio bowls another googly with international calling rates at 50 p/min

Reliance Jio Infocomm announced a new unlimited postpaid plan on Thursday with national roaming, international calling and international roaming plans among others.

The 'zero touch' plan, starting at Rs 199, comes with auto payment and add-on services like access to the Jio app universe similar to what Vodafone Red, Airtel Infinity and Idea Nirvana plans have in place.

The new  ISD calling activated plan comes with international calling rates starting at Rs 50p/minute and roaming charges at Rs 2/ min and Rs 2/ MB for countries like US and Canada.

International roaming plans are split across Rs 575 to Rs 5,751 price range. While international calling rates are distributed across six price slabs ranging from 50 p/ min to Rs 6 /min, international roaming charges are split across two slabs of Rs 2/min and Rs 10/min.

This plan is likely to deal a heavy blow to incumbent telcos who so far still had a strong presence in the international calling arena due to their presence or collaborations across international networks. 

However, in case of the existing players, subscribers have to explicitly provide consent to activate international calling or make a security deposit. Further international roaming service is charged explicitly by other telcos. 

Unlimited services are available in United Arab Emirates, United States, Thailand, Singapore, United Kingdom, Germany, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Turkey, New Zealand, Philippines, Hungary, Greece, Portugal, Romania, Czech Republic, Ireland. The postpaid plan will be available for use starting 15th May. 

Late last month rival Vodafone had launched two new international calling and roaming plans applicable across certain countries starting at Rs 180/ day. Similar to Vodafone and Airtel, Jio has also introduced home delivery and activation services for subscribers.

Postpaid services from other telecom players start around Rs 399 with an average of 20 GB data cap.