3 April 2007
New legislation which limits the amount mobile phone operators can charge for connection fees between different companies have been slammed by BT for punishing home phone customers to help mobile phone users.
Speaking to Computer Business Review Online, John Petter, Chief Operations Officer at BT Retail, said: "This is a disappointing decision and is inconsistent with EU advice.
"It seems strange that UK landline customers will have to subsidise the cost of the 3G licenses but get no benefit from them."
"The mobile call termination rate has been too high for too long and will force UK landline customers to continue to subsidise the mobile industry, now in the region of £500 million plus over the next four years," he added.
Jim Marsh, Chief Executive Officer of Cable & Wireless Plc, also accused the regulator of being "overly generous to the mobile operators".
"Fixed network customers will bear the brunt by paying above the odds for calling mobile users - money which the mobile operators will use to subsidise the retail tariffs they offer to their own customers.
"To be clear, we're talking around £1.5 billion over the next four years...that's not small beer," Mr Marsh concluded, before adding that Cable and Wireless were considering how best to take up the issue with Ofcom.
When announcing the tariff changes last week, the regulator declared that the new rules would benefit home phone customers as much as it would mobile phone users as a clampdown on the inflated prices would make it far cheaper to call a mobile number from a landline.
© 2008 Adfero Ltd
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