Rel Jio lobs a googly to Trai, free data offer may run till March
Even though telecom regulator Trai has said no service provide can offer promotional offers for more than 90 days, Reliance Jio may extend another promotional offer till March 2017, allowing users to make free calls and use data for free.
TRAI has ruled that Reliance Jio’s welcome offer, under which customers were provided free SIM cards along with the free calls and free data usage promotional offer that was scheduled till December 31 have to stopped by December 3.
The decision comes after incumbent operators pointed out that no telecom service provider can offer promotional offers over a period of 90 days.
However, Reliance Jio after the Trai ruling said that existing customers will be able to make free calls and use data till December 31 before moving to a commercial tariff plan submitted by Jio to Trai.
But what does this mean? “A customer who buys a Jio SIM card after December 3 has to move to a tariff plan and will not be eligible for the free calls, free data offer,” Vinod Kotwal , senior advisor (F&EA) at TRAI, told HT adding that no operator can exceed the 90-day promo period.
There have been speculations that Reliance Jio wants to extend another promotional offer as it feels that its customers were denied good service due to denial of points of interconnect (POIS) by incumbent operators.
At a press conference after Reliance Industries reported its second-quarter earnings last week, Anshuman Thakur, head of strategy and planning at Reliance Jio, had said: “We have told Trai and the government that customers have faced issues with regard to the quality of service due to the interconnection congestion . And till we are in a position where we can deliver the quality of service as desired by the Jio management, it will be unfair to charge the customer.”
Thakur said that Jio did not need permission from the telecom regulator to extend free services beyond December.
“Trai tariff is under forbearance. What TRAI requires operators to do is file the tariff plans with Trai so that if they have any comments they can come back. This is post seven days of implementing the tariff,” he said.
Thankur’s comments are also backed by analysts. “Mass-scale free welcome offer could continue until March 2017 to attract subscriber growth towards the celebrated 100 million mark with Rjio’s indicative data pricing at ₹130-140 per giga byte,” Motilal Oswal analysts said in a report.
This poses a problem Trai has never faced before. “Jio can keep on running promotional offers of various kinds for 90-day periods,” a former senior TRAI official said