Reliance Jio Infocomm made a major move by introducing a 6 paise per minute charge on outgoing calls to other networks. As you would expect, the Reliance Jio subscribers were not pleased by this move. Now to give a small relief to its customers, Reliance Jio has come up with a new offer. The Mukesh Ambani led telecom operator is offering 30 minutes of free talk time to the customers to pacify them. As per a new ET report on the matter, the new offer comes not even 48 hours later after Reliance Jio announced that it would be charging IUC of 6 paise per minute from its subscribers. It’s also worth noting that the information about this 30 minutes free talk time is being circulated through SMS to the customers who are recharging their Reliance Jio numbers.
30 Minutes Talk Time Offer Explained
A person aware of the developments in this regard said, “Customers will get free talk time of 30 minutes the first time they recharge their phones. This one-time offer will be available for the first seven days from the date the plan was announced.” He also added that this is a handholding exercise by Reliance Jio for a better transition to the new pricing which has been introduced by the telco.
Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea, on the other hand, have taken the opportunity to lure customers on their network and have rolled out campaigns which concern the same. It is also likely that the rival duo is likely to gain some subscribers out of this decision for some time as highlighted by the Ind-Ra report on the matter. The new decision by the latest telco entrant has also sparked some anger on Twitter where the subscribers are unhappy about the decision of Reliance Jio. Most customers are reminding Reliance Jio of its promise of a lifetime worth of free unlimited calls which the telco talked about during its early days in the industry. Not only this, but some of the customers have even threatened to port out of Reliance Jio. All of this controversy has also led to the rise of of the #boycott-Jio hashtag.
Rival Telcos Start Circling Around Reliance Jio
However, this is not it as soon after there was also a #ilovejio hashtag trending on Twitter from the people who are supportive of the telecom operator. The people also did not spare the line-up of plans and went on to mock the new offerings of Rs 10, Rs 20 and others which allowed these subscribers to make calls to other networks. But, the telecom operator responded by saying that it is offering equivalent data for the same price with these plans to make up for it. But, as you would expect, this has not been enough for the Reliance Jio subscribers to be pacified.
As soon as Reliance Jio made the move of charging IUC from its customers, the rival telcos were quick to respond with their respective campaigns to poach subscribers from the telecom operator. This time again, the battlefield was Twitter as Airtel tweeted about its voice calls being truly unlimited and urging the customers to choose Airtel over other telecom operators. Vodafone also joined this bandwagon and tweeted on the similar lines lettings the public know that it continues to offer free unlimited voice calls and is not going to charge any IUC from its customers.
According to Jio, the postponement of Trai’s shift to a zero-IUC regime is what compelled it to levy the charges on its users. As per the new report from Ind-Ra on the matter, the levying of the IUC on its customers will also help the telecom operator in upping its ARPU by Rs 9, and it would increase the EBITDA of the company by another 8% to 9%.
