Ministry refuses request to cut cellphone charges

The Ministry of Information and Communications has turned down a proposal from leading mobile phone service providers Viettel and the VNPT to reduce rates by 10-20 per cent.

Viet Nam Posts and Telecommunications Group (VNPT) operates both the Vinaphone and MobiFone systems. This is the second time this year the nation’s largest mobile phone service providers have submitted the proposal to the ministry. However, in refusing it, the ministry said that tariff reductions needed to follow regulations promulgated last month requiring providers to submit detailed price proposals including costs and estimates of profits or losses.

“The ministry will agree to a reduction suited to the market based on this data,” said the head of the ministry’s telecommunications department, Pham Hong Hai. “However, none of the providers submitted the full and detail reports as required.”

The regulation aimed to ensure healthy competition amongst telecoms, he added, noting that guidelines on computing profit and loss in a consistent manner were being worked out with the Ministry of Finance. Each mobile phone service providers had treated costs such as network infrastructure and depreciation differently, making it difficult to apply a common standard. Rate reductions by the three leading providers were also a worry to smaller telecoms unable to compete with the low rates. — VNS

Tags: Vietnam Mobile charges, Vietnam Telecom, Vietnam telecom maket

Posted by VBN on Jul 17 2010. Filed under Telecommunication. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry