The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has asked the Indian telecom operators including Reliance Jio, Vodafone Idea, and Bharti Airtel to reduce the price of their voice-only plans. For the unaware, Airtel recently reduced the price of its voice and SMS-only plans by a small margin. The telco removed its Rs 499 and Rs 1959 tariffs and lowered them to Rs 469 and Rs 1849, keeping the benefits the same. Telcos have been asked by TRAI to lower the tariffs of their voice and SMS-only plans and the price reduction should be in line with the reduction of the data benefits, said an ET report.
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Compared to the original tariff of Rs 509 for 84 days, the Rs 469 plan for 84 days is not a major difference in the price. Thus, these plans are not technically very much affordable than before, but there's an obvious price cut. However, the only question that needs to be answered here is if this achieves the goal of TRAI behind the order to mandate voice and SMS-only plans.
Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea (Vi) are yet to make changes to their recently introduced plans. As and when these plans are updated, you will get the updates at TelecomTalk. Telcos have been against the voice and SMS-only plans, and have communicated the same before to TRAI. These plans are likely going to be chosen by people who are looking to keep their secondary SIM cards active, and mostly 2G users.
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TRAI gets to examine the new vouchers after they are added by the telcos. The operators need to submit the vouchers to TRAI withing seven days of launching them. The coming few days are going to be interesting as these plans are against the approach of the telcos to boost their average revenue per user (ARPU).
