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Azerbaijan to trim down mobile phone charges

21 January 2009 16:01 (UTC +04:00)

Eliyar Temirov, officer of Azerbaijanâ€™s Ministry of Communications and Information Technologies, said the prices that operators charge on mobile phone calls are, on average, several times higher than those in other countries.
According to him, these charges were, in part, to blame for Azerbaijanâ€™s lagging behind some countries for the number of cell-phone users because high prices limit the use of mobile services.
â€œTo offset the balance in the market and to prevent unfair competition, asymmetrical regulation is exercised in the international practice by to supporting a new entrant against the established incumbent service providers. Moreover, the mobile call prices may be reduced by cutting the fees that operators levy for switching callers between each other’s networks,â€ he added.
According to him, the ministry has negotiated with the two large operators â€“ Azercell and Bakcell and convinced them to cut prices.
The Tariff Council has approved the move to lower the so-called termination rates that mobile operators can charge each other to connect calls between their networks within the antimonopoly policy.
According to the survey, it is expedient to impose benefits to the advantage of weak competitors in the market. The asymmetrical regulation will support Azerfon (Nar Mobile) as a new market entrant.