Telcos warn of hike in mobile tariffs

Raising the voice against TRAI's regulation on call drops, telecom operators on Tuesday warned that mobile tariff will go up if they are forced to pay compensation for dropped calls. The operators have also asserted that it is not possible to make a network free from call drops.

In a joint letter to Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, telecom industry bodies said that the regulation is an invitation for limitless misuse and gaming of the system that as per estimates will lead to a three per cent hit on revenues.

The TRAI has mandated operators to compensate consumers from January 1 if they face call drop problem. However, the regulation limits compensation to only three call drops in a day which means maximum compensation can be of Rs. 3 in a day to a consumer.

Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had said recently that call drop issue is starting to improve. The Minister named telecom operators like Airtel, Aircel, Idea, Vodafone and Tata Tele among those having contained the problem and said nearly half of the defective mobile sites have been fixed to address the menace.

The regulator had in June and July conducted drive tests in Mumbai and Delhi, which showed unsatisfactory network quality. TRAI than convened a meeting of all telecom operators to improve quality of network.