Call charges to be slightly higher than illegal operators'

The legalisation of internet telephony may slightly increase overseas call rates compared to the charges offered by illegal VoIP (voice over internet protocol) providers, as the establishment cost will go up because of mandatory licensing.

"The call charges largely depend on licence fees and security deposit," Akhtaruzzaman Manju, president of the Internet Service Providers Association (ISPA), told The Daily Star yesterday.

He said call charges would be higher if the government set high fees for licences and higher security deposit and suggested bank guarantee instead of security deposit.

The concern came after the government Monday decided to legalise internet telephony on a set of conditions.

The move however will bring down overseas call charges to a third of the rate fixed by the landline phone monopoly Bangladesh Telegraph and Telephone Board (BTTB).

The telecoms watchdog, Bangladesh Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (BTRC), is likely to prepare a set of criteria for enabling entrepreneurs to launch internet telephony by the yearend or early next year, a top official said.

"We are thinking of framing a set of criteria so that entrepreneurs can launch VoIP by next March," BTRC Chairman Syed Marghub Murshed told reporters.

The state-owned BTTB has recently proposed lowering its international call charges to catch up with VoIP.

"We have sent a proposal to the post and telecommunications ministry to reduce the call charges to stay competitive with VoIP," a BTTB official said.

But cellphone operators have expressed concern over the cabinet's decision that all calls generating and terminating from the internet would go through BTTB's international gateway.

"It is against the BTRC proposal," said an official with a leading cellphone operator.

BTRC officials, however, said an internet gateway would be commissioned exclusively for internet telephony by the BTRC, which will award licences and oversee the operation of VoIP operators.

The cellphone operators have a plan to terminate international incoming calls to 'cellphone-to-cellphone' subscribers accounting for 70 percent of the country's 1.5 million mobile phone users.

The government did not legalise VoIP before fearing that the public operator BTTB may lose revenues. A third of BTTB's average annual income of Tk 1,500 crore comes from overseas calls.

Internet telephony will help local IT entrepreneurs set up call centres and medical transcript and tele-medicine business.

VoIP service minutes are expected to leap to 600 billion from 0.325 billion in the Asia-Pacific, generating $48 billion in revenue by 2006, up from $78 million in 1999, according to a report.

The region formed 29.4 percent of the world market in terms of revenue in 1999 and is expected to constitute nearly 37 percent by 2006.

"We will earn more than $2 billion till 2006, if we could grab a fraction of the region's calls through VoIP," the ISPA president said.

Earlier, the Infrastructure Investment Facilitation Centre recommended licence fees ranging between Tk 30 lakh and Tk 40 lakh.

But sources said the cabinet asked the BTRC to set a higher licence fee to discourage shady firms.

The ISPA suggested that the authorities should not impose too much of financial load on VoIP licences to keep the service within the easy reach.