 |
Lower Rates for Chinese Mobile Users
Bowing to increasing consumer complaints of unreasonable charges and fierce competition, the China Mobile Communications Corp (CMCC) Thursday initiated a package of price readjustments to be implemented beginning today.
The price incentives waived monthly fees and commission charges for mobile services including manual roaming, call transferring and change in mobile phone ownership, and dramatically reduced the fees for short message and mobile banking services.
However, the new arrangement failed to tackle the most sensitive issue of charges on both incoming and outgoing mobile calls. Mobile telecom operators in most countries in Europe and Asia do not charge for incoming calls.
The two-way charge regime and the mandatory collection of a 50 yuan (US$6) monthly rental fee regardless of phone use have drawn chronic criticism from subscribers.
The short message and information-on-demand service, however, does enjoy the one-way charge privilege, Lu Xiangdong, vice-president of CMCC, told a news conference Thursday in Beijing.
According to the new price package, short message senders no longer have to pay 10 yuan (US$1.2) every month for use of the service. Instead, they will be charged 0.10 yuan (US$0.012) ).
In the past, both senders and receivers were charged 0.40 yuan (US$0.05) for a message.
The 0.10 yuan charge rate will be also applied to every piece of information users receive on weather forecasts, flights schedule, stock quotes or foreign exchanges via their mobile phones, Lu said.
Previously, such a piece of information could cost up to 0.50 yuan (US$0.06).
"The latest price cuts aim to make the fee charging structure of China Mobile more reasonable and transparent,'' Lu said. He admitted that the new incentives could create a huge dent to the company's revenue this year.
Lu said he expected the price readjustments, and efforts to improve service will help CMCC grab a larger share of the market and win the trust and support of customers.
CMCC user pool will gain 20 million to 60 million new subscribers this year while business revenue is set to increase 25 per cent to 103.8 billion yuan (US$12.5 billion), according to earlier company releases.
Despite the seemingly alluring price readjustments, many mobile phone subscribers said they are expecting more "substantial actions'' from CMCC.
"What the company offered today does not mean too much for ordinary mobile phone users,'' said Li Guang, a Beijing-based mobile phone subscriber. "Few of us use the information-on-demand or short message services.''
What users really care about are the reduction or cancellation of the 50-yuan monthly rental and the two-way charge system, said Li.
Lu argued that his company was not empowered to make any changes to the rental and mobile phone charging system. But he said telecommunications authorities are studying the issues.
In This Section
|