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COAI: Telcos have been demanding a fair share from the LTGs, emphasising the need for equitable cost distribution amid rising infrastructure expenses and increasing costs of network deployment and maintenance by the telcos.
The large traffic-generating platforms, despite earning both from subscription fees and advertising revenues, do not contribute to the network costs financially, rued Cellular Operators' Association of India (COAI) whose prominent members include Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea.
Telecom operators in India, the second largest wireless market, would like internet companies to compensate for using their networks, a recommendation they've made to the local regulatory body, echoing a viewpoint that is gaining some momentum in other parts of the world. Jio, India's largest telecom operator with more than 450 million subscribers, recommended to the local regulator that internet companies should be made to "contribute" towards telecom network costs based on the traffic they consume, their turnover and number of users.
Companies such as Meta have said such a move would not solve the telcos' financial problems and ignores hefty investments by tech companies.
But these latest price rises are not going up by the same proportion. london's seeing the smallest increase, up 8 pence a day, while north wales and merseyside are seeing their standing charge double this week, up an extra 23 pence. the regulator sets a different maximum standing charge in each area. ofgem told us that some regions are increasing more than others because of a reallocation of network costs. that means people living here in liverpool will have to find an extra £50 a year compared to people living in london, just to cover that standing charge increase. surprise, surprise, it's l...