PRESS: Reg operators protest against abolition of internal roaming

MOSCOW, Oct 8 (PRIME) -- Russian regional mobile operators, which service about 3.5 million people, have strongly opposed zero payments for incoming calls in national roaming, the reform that has already been followed by bigger operators, business daily Kommersant reported on Monday, citing several sources.

The matter was discussed at a private meeting held by Vladislav Fedulov, head of the IT department at the government, on October 1. “A decision is expected to be made upon its results to be further submitted to the State Duma (the parliament’s lower house) for deliberation of the bill on the abolition of roaming,” one of the sources told the daily.

Regional operators warned the government of their losses from cancelation of payments for incoming calls in roaming, which is imposed by the corresponding bill, earlier approved in the first out of three mandatory readings by the State Duma.

Small companies are certain of their inability to compensate for losses since they will still be obliged to pay full costs of roaming to partners on the territories where they do not have networks. The legislative move could squeeze such operators from the market or result in a dramatic rise in prices.

Approved in the first reading in July, the bill says that payment for connections between subscribers within the country must be charged under a single tariff regardless of their location.

In August, the Federal Antimonopoly Service ordered top four national operators – MTS, MegaFon, VimpelCom, and T2 RTK Holding – to cancel intra-network roaming, when the operators applied different tariffs to different regions of the country. They also made prices for incoming calls, Internet traffic, and SMS equal to home region prices and cancelled payments for incoming calls across the country.

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