TELEPHONE TARIFFS NOT RISING
Vasak Tarposhyan
Hayots Ashkharh Daily Newspaper
21 Aug 2007
Armenia
"ArmenTel Changes Its Mind"
"ArmenTel" has taken back its claim for changing telephone tariffs,
by which they proposed an abrupt rise of especially the local
telecommunication service prices. The company informed the Commission
on the Regulation of Public Services about this on August 17.
Taking into consideration the before mentioned fact, during its August
24 session the commission is planning to take a corresponding decision,
according to which the current so called transitional tariffs will
be unchangeable.
"As a result of the negotiation between the Commission on the
Regulation of Public Services and "ArmenTel" CSC, on August 17,
2007, "ArmenTel" has submitted corresponding substantiations and
has proposed to keep unchangeable the prices of its basic and non
basic services, considering it maximum and "re-balanced" tariffs,"
the draft decision runs.
As we know on July 1 "ArmenTel" placed an order with the Commission
on the Regulation of Public Service regarding the clarification and
re-balancing of the tariffs of telecommunication service.
After the refusal of the claim the 45 days negotiation stage
started. The process seemed to draw to a close with certain reduction
of the tariffs. But 10 days before the end of the negotiation term
"ArmenTel" announced about taking back the claim.
Of course this step of the company is praiseworthy, but on the
other hand it is strange. We should remind you that with this claim
"ArmenTel" proposed to rise almost twice the subscriber fees of the
local net – from 1100 to 2040, to reduce the unpaid time limit with
5 drams, instead of 361-1600 to 1000 minutes.
Besides that price-rises were expected also for telephone installation
15000 instead of 12000 drams. It was also proposed to raise twice
the tariff of Internet service via telephone line 2 drams instead of 1.
With the price-rise they proposed to reduce the prices of international
calls, by 40-70%. There were some changes in the installation of
mobile net.
This version of changes was conditioned by the necessity of
re-balancing the tariffs of telecommunication service. That is to
say the tariff of the local telecommunication services should not
be compensated by the high prices of the international calls. But
suddenly it came clear that the current prices are not only balanced
but can be considered "maximum".
Such an abrupt change couldn’t take place in the market structure
during some month. Moreover to bring to such a re-balance of the
tariffs that only three months back gave big differences. The only
explanation here is that the order placed by the company was, mildly
speaking, not grounded, and was simply aimed at gaining super-profit.
The fact of taking back their claim is conditioned by the
liberalization of the telecommunication market, by which a new
situation is created for the participants of the market. Naturally
after the liberalization the situation of the market is changed,
but it is hard to imagine that "ArmenTel" was unaware of this fact
three months back.
We should underscore that during the session to take place on August 24
the commission is planning to make amendments in the license 60 given
to "ArmenTel". By this, in essence, Armenian telecommunication market
is totally liberalized. As we know after gaining "ArmenTel" shares
the new owners expressed readiness to refuse monopoly. Before that
monopoly had stopped functioning in the sphere of mobile communication,
which contributed to the abrupt reduction of prices.
These changes will most probably bring to the reduction of prices
for some services.