Not Mark Jimenez again

A company owned by the family of Rep. Mark Jimenez (Mark Crespo) is being investigated by the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) for "cheating"

It appears that Meridian Telecom, which is actually being managed by his daughter, has been the subject of complaint from several companies for not transmitting within its band or frequency. And because it has not been utilizing its allocated spectrum, Meridian is saving on spectrum users’ fees.

One company that was victimized by Meridian’s unfair practice, according to sources, is Destiny Cable. Among its latest victims, which have similarly called the attention of the NTC, are the Manila Electric Company (Meralco), San Miguel Corp. (SMC), and even the Western Police District.

It is actually easy to determine whether Meridian is not using its own spectrum. There is a device, called the spectrum analyzer, that will reveal this. Unfortunately, either NTC people are being prevented from entering Meridian’s premises to conduct the inspection, or the company is quick enough to terminate its illegal activity everytime NTC personnel are around to inspect.

And now, Meridian is charging NTC of harassment. This is the reason why NTC director for the National Capital Region Bert Ramirez is said to be having nightmares.

All these violations of the law just to save on P120,000 a year in spectrum fees? And to think that a lawyer is said to be the one advising Meridian management on how to circumvent NTC regulations.

AT&T’s black ops

It appears that American giant AT&T will stop at nothing to prevent local telecommunications companies from increasing their termination charges for calls coming from the United States terminating in the Philippines.

Firstly, AT&T officials claim that the rate adjustment effected by the local telcos will wreak economic havoc on the Philippines.

Termination charges are the charges made by one telco on the other for terminating calls to the other’s network. So when a call is made from the US through AT&T landing in a Philippine landline, the local telco, say for instance PLDT, will charge AT&T 12 cents (as against a previous eight to nine cents a minute). If AT&T charges its customer 23 cents a minute, then only 11 cents will go to AT&T and the rest to the Philippine telco.

If AT&T is not going to increase its call rates, so how can the local telco’s increase of its termination rate have any effect on the economy? The problem is, AT&T has already reportedly increased its call rates but is not agreeing to the increased Philippine call termination rate of 12 cents for landline and 16 cents for cellular calls.

AT&T’s Chip Barton also claims that the call center industry, a pet project of President Arroyo, will suffer, because of the recent increase in termination rates, but what he is not saying is that all circuits to call center establishments in the Philippines are open and the flow of traffic remains unhampered, and that majority of lines to call center businesses are "private" or "leased" lines, the rates of which are unaffected by this recent rate adjustment.

What local telcos cannot understand is how AT&T can pay other carriers (say in Hong Kong) to terminate the calls in the Philippines a higher rate when it can pay 12 cents a minute if the traffic is transmitted directly to the Philippine telcos. AT&T will have to pay a Hong Kong carrier a higher rate because the latter will have to be charged by say PLDT 12 cents. AT&T has been doing this just to stick by its stand that it will not agree to the local telcos’ unilateral move to increase their termination rates.

AT&T is heavily indebted. No way will it agree to share its profits from calls to the Philippines with its little brown brothers.

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