New phone rates likely to be approved

The Malta Communications Authority is in the coming days expected to communicate its decision to Maltacom over the company's request for a tariff rebalancing exercise.

It is expected that the MCA will approve tariff rebalancing, which would mean that local rates will go up while international rates will be drastically reduced.

Sources indicated that the authority was expected to decide in favour of the exercise. However, the telecoms regulator would not necessarily accept the proposals made by Maltacom, "in the sense that the increases were not necessarily expected to be as hefty as proposed".

Maltacom had suggested a reduction in its international rates by an average of 47 per cent, offset by a hefty increase in its local call rate.

It is also proposing that the rental rate for fixed lines would go up from Lm24 to Lm30 per year in residential cases and from Lm52 to Lm72 for business.

Maltacom had proposed that a three-minute local call would start costing 5c35 (inclusive of VAT) and that after the first three minutes, the figure that would be charged Mondays to Saturdays between 6 a.m. and 7.30 p.m. would be 0.047c per second.

This basically means that the charge for five minutes at this rate would be around 11c, double the current rate. For Sundays, Maltacom had proposed that the rate between 6 a.m. and 7.30 p.m. would be 5c per 10 minutes.

An innovative proposal is for calls made between 7.30 and 8.30 p.m. on all days of the week to be free of charge. Calls made after 8.30 p.m. would be charged at 5c per hour.

Maltacom had also proposed to keep its present social rebate to some 5,000 customers.

The sources said the telecoms' regulatory body had carried out a comprehensive analysis of the impact that the proposed rates would have on the economy, customers and Maltacom.

The sources also said that one of the MCA's prime concerns was the social aspect of the proposed tariffs. "A detailed analysis of every customer profile has been examined in great detail. The analysis was carried out on different consumer patterns, including heavy, average and low users."

The MCA is expected to notify the public about its decision and it is also expected that Maltacom will issue a notice to its customers before the new tariffs come into force.

"It is expected that Maltacom will give at least 30 days' notice to its customers before the new tariffs come into force."