The sate-run telephone operator is going to expand its economy overseas call service to another 15 countries from April 1 to check its income downslide due to a wide use of illegal internet telephony.
Bangladesh Telegraph and Telephone Board (BTTB) subscribers with international subscriber dialling (ISD) and nation wide dialling (NWD) facilities will enjoy the reduced tariff of Tk 7.5 per minute, official sources said.
The 15 countries added to the economy call tariff are China, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Brunei, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxemburg, Ireland, Spain, Greece and Austria.
The BTTB introduced the Tk 7.5 tariff a minute on December 30, 2003 for overseas calls to 10 countries including the USA, Canada, England, France, Italy, Germany, Australia, Malaysia, Singapore and Hong Kong. And the step generated an encouraging response, significantly boosting its revenue from overseas calls to those countries.
According to the BTTB statistics, the board's revenue earning from those 10 countries rose to about Tk 9.4 crore a month on average after the 2003 introduction of economy ISD rate from some Tk 8.27 crore earlier.
Encouraged, the board in January this year placed a proposal to the telecom ministry to expand the economy rate also for the new 15 countries. The proposal was then forwarded to the finance ministry, and Finance Minister M Saifur Rahman approved it recently and notified the decision to the post and telecommunications ministry.
Illegal internet telephony or Voice-over Internet Protocol (VoIP) now drains out nearly Tk 1,000 crore business of BTTB a year.
"We're looking for ways to increase our income as VoIP has badly hit our revenue, which is still on the decline. A reduced rate will help us increase the income, as roughly 40 per cent of BTTB's revenue comes from international calls," a highly placed BTTB source explained.
The BTTB currently charges Tk 24 and Tk 18 per minute respectively during the peak and off-peak hours for calling to China, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Brunei, and Tk 27 and Tk 21 during the peak and off-peak hours for the rest of the proposed 15 countries.
From April 1 the NWD telephone users will be able to make ISD calls to these countries at the economy rate through direct dialling by using a new code '012'. A subscriber will also can make calls to those countries by using the existing '00' code but for existing charges.
The board, however, proposed a Tk 18 charge per minute for making calls to mobile phones in 11 of the 15 countries excluding China, South Korea, Thailand and Brunei.
The government first decided to legalise VoIP in June 2002 and a cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Khaleda Zia cleared the decision on November 10, 2003. However, the decision is yet to be implemented.
