Major mobile operators in recent weeks increased prices of their services significantly, a move that the Communications Regulatory Authority says is within the perimeters of law but not supported so far by the relevant authorities .
In a talk with the news website Peivast, CRA boss Hossein Fallah said, “CRA has clear regulations regarding rates of mobile phone services and Internet charges. The increases announced by the two major operators [MCI and Irancell] are in line with these regulations.”
Unifying their pricing systems, major mobile operators MTN-Irancell and Mobile Telecommunications Company of Iran (MCI) increased rates of basic phone services last week.
Following the move and irrespective of which operator you have a subscription with, making a phone call on a cellphone costs 599 rials per minute for users with prepaid subscription and 899 rials for those with a pay-as-you-go plan.
The steepest price hike, 80%, was announced by Irancell which until recently charged customers with prepaid subscriptions 333 rials/minute.
Fallah says, “Costs of services have not gone above the price caps mandated by the CRA.”
>Ten Percent Dearer
Earlier last month, in another simultaneous move Irancell and MCI revised their Internet service pricing procedures making them a bit costlier.
According to Fallah, “Some Internet packages are now 8-10% dearer.”
He adds that due to the price hike, “During the past month [ended Sept. 23] the two operators’ revenue from Internet services grew by 3% and there has been a visible change in usage patterns.”
Usage pattern describes the behavioral patterns of mobile phone users. It is reported that the average Iranian mobile Internet subscriber has curbed usage to cut costs.
Two years ago the CRA introduced a price cap system for mobile operators, which says Internet services for prepaid SIMs and pay-as-you-go subscribers cannot be priced above 419,430 rials ($3.04) and 629,145 rials ($4.56) per gigabyte. This means operators have more space to increase prices.
Fallah says “The ICT Ministry [and CRA by extension] has always favored providing communication services at the lowest possible rates. The state body is disappointed by the price hike, however, this does not mean that operates have broken the law.”
Earlier ICT Minister Mohammad Javad Azari-Jahromi said due to the economic hardships the overhead costs of the communications industry have increased. Nevertheless, he is of the opinion that “the operators should not have addressed the problems by simply increasing prices.”
