#JioEffect: These companies to stop lifetime free incoming calls

NP NEWS 24 ONLINE –In India, over 95 per cent of mobile phone users are prepaid subscribers, and telecom operators are constantly revising their tariff plans with improved benefits to attract new subscribers.

The “lifetime free incoming” calls facility was introduced a decade ago, where subscribers paid around Rs 999 to avail the service. To continue with the service and free incoming calls, users were required to do a minimum recharge of at least Rs 10 in six months. But that benefit is about to end soon as Indian telecom operators have recently made major changes to their tariff plans.

This will surely hit many people who depend on this facility. There are many users especially in rural areas who have mobile phones dedicated for incoming calls only. These users rarely perform any recharges. Even if they do, they recharge their SIM with just Rs 10 or thereabouts. This has resulted in the low ARPU for the telecoms.

Now, telecom firms have decided to actually charge the users for incoming calls. Yes, it is shocking, but that is exactly what they are doing now. These companies have already started to come up with the minimum recharge plans. These plans come with the validity of 28 days and the minimum recharge may be of Rs 35. Airtel has already listed out three such recharge plans – Rs 35, Rs 65 and Rs 95.

Essentially, recharging with these minimum prepaid plans would ensure that you continue getting mobile services, especially incoming calls. The Rs 35 plan also includes talk time of Rs 26 and 100MB data, which should be good enough for those who don’t use data and make many outgoing calls.

The situation is not ideal and Indian mobile phone users have got used to their freebies, especially the ones they have been enjoying for years. How exactly this new step by Telcom’s is received by them will be known soon though.