BPL Mobile slashes STD rates by 50%

In a move that could trigger another price war, Mumbai-based BPL Mobile has slashed pre-paid STD call rates by around 50 per cent.

The company has also changed the name of its subsidiary ShippingStop.com, under which it had applied for pan-India licence, to Loop Telecom.

The company has launched a new card, the India One Pre-paid, under which users can make STD calls at a flat rate of Re 1 per minute. SMSes to any destination in the country would also be charged at a flat rate of Re 1 per message, BPL Mobile director and CEO S Subramaniam told Business Standard in an interview.

"We have been registering a phenomenal growth in STD calls during the last six months from Mumbai, especially by our pre-paid users. We have reduced the tariffs so as to bring in more users to our network," he said.

Apart from the tariff being 50 per cent lower than the company's existing pre-paid schemes, it also brings in a single tariff for the company.

At present, calls from BPL to BPL are priced at Re 1 per minute, BPL to other networks and landlines at Rs 2.25, STD calls at Rs 2.49 and SMS at Rs 1.50, while inter-circle SMSes are priced at Rs 2 per message.

BPL Mobile recorded over 50 million minutes of outgoing STD calls, mainly to states such as Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Gujarat, while calls were also made to places in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Kerala by pre-paid subscribers.

BPL Mobile, which operates only in Mumbai, has a total of around 1.3 million users, of which 70 per cent are pre-paid customers.

In September 2007, BPL Mobile upped the ante in the telecom tariff war by lowering the entry-level barrier in the industry through a scheme that allowed users to go mobile at a meagre Rs 110. At that time, the lowest tariff in the industry stood at around Rs 298.

According to an analyst, users would lap up these schemes, especially in a price-sensitive market such as India, and this would prompt other players to follow suit.

Meanwhile, the company has also changed the name of its subsidiary ShippingStop.com, through which it had applied for pan-India telecom licence,- to Loop Telecom.

Essar Group holds a minority stake in BPL Mobile, while the ownership of the company is under arbitration.