The Department of Communications, cellphone companies and Telkom are finalising plans to address call termination rates this year, President Thabo Mbeki announced on Friday.
This would be to the benefit of all consumers, he told Parliament in his State of the Nation address.
Termination fees are charged by individual cellphone operators to other telephone companies for calls made from fixed-line phones to mobiles.
In addition, Telkom would apply a special low rate for international bandwidth to ten ”development call centres”, each employing 1 000 people, as part of the effort to expand the business process outsourcing sector.
These centres would be established in areas identified by the government.
The special rate would be directly comparable to those for the same service and capacity per month offered in any comparable country. – Sapa