PLDT eyes cut in int'l call rates

The Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) is studying the possibility of bringing down its international toll rates in view of the global trends toward very low call charges.

Manuel Pangilinan, PLDT president and chief executive officer, said that their existing international long distance (ILD) pricing scheme is currently under review, although he refused to reveal the timetable for the adoption of the new rates.

Pangilinan said they have no choice but to make their ILD rates competitive and reflective of the real cost of providing the service especially with the continuous decline in the accounting rates.

Accounting rate is the amount shared by a local and foreign carrier for international calls made through their systems. The rate, has gone down from about $2 per minute several years ago to only $0.38 at present.

As a result, the proportion of PLDT's revenues from ILD went down to 32 percent but Pangilinan is confident that the drop could be offset by the firm's aggressive efforts to encourage higher inbound traffic.

He said the lower accounting rates is actually a positive measure since it provides increased flexibility to terminate more US call traffic into the Philippines, minimize unauthorized ILD providers and recover traffic lost due to illegal routing of calls.

PLDT has the highest ILD rate among the local operations though the telecom giant has started to open up by introducing some promotional ILD offers.

In another development, PLDT's rival company, Globe Telecom has come up with another promotional rate for this month which would provide its landline and cellular phone subscribers with as much as 69 percent savings of national direct dial (NDD) calls.

Under the offer, Globe will provide the lowest flat rate of P3 for calls between its Globelines fixed line service anywhere in the country as well as between Globelines and Globe Handyphone mobile phones.

The rate supplies during peak and off-peak hours daily and is inclusive of the 10 percent value-added tax.

The promo, however, does not cover operator-assisted domestic long distance calls and calls made on Globe Handyphone to Globelines.

The move forms part of the company's efforts to bring down the cost of telephone service which started early this year with the reduction of regular international direct dial (IDD) rates to $0.70 per minute on peak hours and $0.50 per minute on off-peak hours both for its landline and mobile phones.

The IDD rates are inclusive of the overseas communications tax, foreign currency adjustment, and currency exchange rate adjustment.