Airtel sparks the most epic tariff war ever, see what Jio is planning

Call charges by minute, seconds, nano seconds are a thing of the past. Indian telecom operators have taken the tariff war to a whole new level, and now they are looking to offer voice calls for free. India’s largest telecom operator, Airtel today announced two new postpaid plans with free unlimited voice calls. These are essentially data plans that will of course come along with bundled 3G/4G data at a slightly higher price.

Airtel’s new ‘Infinity’ plans will include unlimited voice calling including STD, and calls made on national roaming, free 100 SMS per day, 3G/4G data and free subscription to Airtel’s music and movie apps, Wynk Music and Wynk Movies. The 1GB infinity plan will cost consumers Rs. 1199 and 5GB plan is priced at Rs. 1599. Airtel had launched ‘myPlan Infinity’ offers for its 3G/4G postpaid mobile customers last year.

Airtel’s move seems to be in anticipation of what Relaince Jio will do. Jio may commercially launch their telecom services on 15th August and it is expected to come with differentiated offers including free voicecalls. A report by Bank of America Merrill Lynch(BoML) says that Jio’s differentiated offering likely would be “free voice” when Jio commercially launches its telco services. The report says “In our view, it will be “unlimited VoLTE voice” bundled with its data offering above Rs 300/month.” Yes, that's right Jio too may look at offering free voice calls but at a much lower price. Currently a Jio sim comes clubbed with their smartphones starting from Rs. 3000 and it offers unlimited free data to consumers for three months. Having partnered with Samsung, Jio is in the process of getting smartphone makers on board to offer their sim bundled with devices.

Vodafone too announced free calls but only as a compensation for call drops. Vodafone will give 10-minute talk time to customers for call drops. "Under Vodafone Delights bonanza - free 10-minute talk time (will be given) to all customers whose conversation gets interrupted for any reason, to avail the benefit" Vodafone India said in a statement.

With Jio planning on the move and Airtel having moved with the plan, it is expected that other players are likely to drop their voice call charges. BoML says there is going to pressure on voice revenues/tariff hikes but they do not believe VoLTE voice will materially impact industry voice revenues for the next 12-18 months.

Image Sources: Indiatimes