Airtel introduces changes to roaming plans

Bharti Airtel on Monday announced changes in its domestic and international roaming plans after Reliance Jio offered free voice calls on its domestic network with no local or roaming charges.

"At Airtel, we are changing the international roaming paradigm, which will allow our customers to take their number to every corner of the world," Sunil Bharti Mittal, Chairman of Bharti Airtel, said in a statement.

"As an industry, operators across the world must collaborate to remove the cost barrier to roaming and offer customers the convenience of staying connected without the fear of exorbitant bill charges."

The company said it will waive off roaming charges on all domestic incoming calls from April 1.

"Starting April 1, Airtel customers roaming within India will enjoy free incoming calls/SMS and there will be no premium on outgoing calls allowing them to speak freely wherever they are within the country," Airtel said.

"There will be no additional data charges on national roaming. Home data packs for customers will apply even while they roam across India," it said in the statement.

The telecom major said it had already launched innovative and affordable international roaming packs for all major countries, which come with convenient validity options of one day, 10 days and 30 days.

"Starting April 1, even customers on international roaming without a pack will be fully protected from bill shocks through an automatic adjustment that is equal to the daily pack for that particular country."

Commenting on the changes to the roaming plans, Gopal Vittal, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer (India & South Asia), Bharti Airtel, said: "This marks the death of national roaming and the whole country will now be like a local network for our customers.

"Airtel has again set the benchmark in delivering best in class value backed by a great network experience."

--IANS

ppg-rv/mr